LIBRARY 

« 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 


m 


L 
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Ill 


THE   DIAMOND    MINES    OF 
SOUTH    AFRICA 

VOL.  I 


THE  DIAMOND  MINES  OF 
SOUTH  AFRICA 


WILL] 

PORTRAIT   OF   GARDNER   F.   WILLIAMS. 


THE  DIAMOND  MINES  OF 
SOUTH  AFRICA 


BY 

GARDNER    F.    WILLIAMS,    M.A. 

GENERAL   MANAGER   OF    DE    BEERS   CONSOLIDATED   MINES,    LTD. 


ILLUSTRATED 


VOL.    I 


NEW   YORK 
B.    F.    BUCK   &   COMPANY 

1 60   FIFTH   AVENUE 
1905 


COPYRIGHT,  1902, 
BY  THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY. 

COPYRIGHT,'  1904, 
BY  GARDNER  F.  WILLIAMS. 


Norwood  Press 

J.  S.   Gushing  &  Co.  —  Berwick  &  Smith  Co. 
Norwood,  Mass.,   U.S.A. 


PREFACE 

THE  original  edition  of  my  work  was  submitted  to  the  judg- 
ment of  the  public  without  preface,  for  I  must  agree  with  the 
view  of  Thomas  Hughes,  that  a  preface  is  unnecessary  if  an 
author  is  content  to  have  his  aim  read  in  what  he  has  written. 

I  do  not  depart  from  this  view  now  in  desiring  to  acknowledge 
the  very  kindly  appreciation  accorded  to  the  first  edition  by  the 
representative  critics  of  the  press  and  by  the  public,  and  my 
particular  indebtedness  to  the  many  friends  who  have  taken 
pains  to  furnish  me  with  desired  information  and  valuable 
illustrations. 

I  may  further  note  simply  that  the  edition  now  offered  has 
been  thoroughly  revised,  enlarged,  and  brought  up  to  date,  with 
the  addition  of  a  number  of  new  and  interesting  illustrations. 

GARDNER  F.  WILLIAMS. 

KIMBERLEV,  SOUTH  AFRICA,  AUGUST,  1904. 


9628  / 


Contents 


VOLUME   I 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I.      THE  ANCIENT  ADAMAS  .......  i 

Physical  Characteristics  of  the  Diamond.  The  Early  History  of 
Diamonds.  Mining  in  India.  Golconda.  Romance  of  Noted 
Diamonds. 

II.      THE  TRADITIONAL  OPHIR  LAND     .          .          .          .          .          .32 

The  Search  for  an  All-sea  Route  to  India.  The  Queen  of  Sheba. 
King  Solomon's  Mines.  Phoenicians  sail  around  Africa,  600  B.C. 
Bartholomeu  Dias  sets  Crosses  at  Angra  Pequena  and  Algoa  Bay, 
A.D.  1486.  Da  Gama's  Voyage.  Encounters  with  Natives. 
The  Mines  of  Ophir.  The  Ancient  Ruins  of  Mashonaland. 
English  and  Dutch  East  India  Companies.  The  Landing  of  Johan 
van  Riebeeck.  The  Settlement  of  the  Cape  by  the  Dutch.  The 
Search  for  the  Land  of  Ophir  by  the  Early  Cape  Settlers.  Com- 
mander Simon  van  der  Stel.  Discovery  of  Copper  in  Namaqua- 
land.  The  British  enter  Table  Bay  and  take  Possession  of  Cape 
Town. 

III.  THE  PIONEER  ADVANCE         .......        87 

Cape  Colony.     The  Dutch  Settlers.     Emancipation  of  the  Slaves. 

The  Great  Trek  of  the  Dutch  to  the  Interior.  The  Zulus. 
Chaka.  The  Matabele.  Tribal  Wars.  The  Clash  between  the 
Boers  and  the  Matabele.  Boers  and  Zulus.  The  South  African 
Republic.  The  Orange  Free  State. 

IV.  THE  DISCOVERY  .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .114 

The  First  South  African  Diamond.  Its  Journey  to  Grahamstown. 
Its  Determination.  "  The  Star  of  South  Africa."  The  Mission 
Stations.  The  First  Mining  on  the  Vaal  River.  The  Influx  of 
Fortune-hunters.  The  Natives  as  Labourers.  Obstacles,  Priva- 
tions, and  Discomforts  at  the  River  Diggings.  The  Great  Karroo. 
The  Mirages.  The  Journey  to  the  Fields.  Game  along  the 
Route.  Klip-drift  and  Pniel. 

vii 


viii  CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

V.      THE  CAMPS  ON  THE  VAAL    .          .          .          .          .          .          .140 

Method  of  mining  Diamonds  in  Brazil.  Early  Mining  at  Klip- 
drift  and  Pniel.  Camp  Life  on  the  River.  The  Climate.  Title 
to  the  Land  along  the  River.  Claims  of  the  South  African  Repub- 
lic and  the  Orange  Free  State.  The  Diggers'  Republic. 

VI.  THE  RUSH  TO  KIMBERLEY     .          .          .          .          .          .          .164 

Discovery  of  Jagersfontein  Mine,  August,  1870.      Diamonds  found 

at  Dutoitspan,  September,  1870.  The  Competition  for  Posses- 
sion of  the  Farm  Dorstfontein.  Original  Occupation  of  Farms. 
Discovery  of  Bultfontein  Mine  early  in  1871.  De  Beers  Mine 
discovered,  May,  1871.  Kimberley  Mine  discovered,  July,  1871, 
by  Fleetvvood  Ravvstorne.  Native  Ownership  of  Country  trans- 
ferred to  Great  Britain.  Arbitration  re  Ownership.  The  Procla- 
mation of  District  as  the  «'  Crown  Colony  of  Griqualand  West." 
Stephen  J.  Paul  Kruger.  Lieutenant-Governor  Mr.  Richard 
Southey.  Methods  of  reaching  the  Fields.  The  Rush  of  Whites 
and  Blacks  to  the  New  Golconda. 

VII.  THE  GREAT  WHITE  CAMPS.          .          .          .          .          .          .190 

The  City  of  the  Pan.      Early  Life  in  Kimberley.      The  London 

and  South  African  Exploration  Company.  Area  covered  by  the 
Four  Mines.  Method  of  working  Kimberley  Mine.  The  Bottom 
of  the  Yellow  Ground  is  reached.  The  Blue  Ground.  Charac- 
teristics of  Diamonds  in  Each  Mine.  Cost  of  Supplies.  The 
Market.  The  Climate.  The  Marvellous  Collection  of  Savages. 

VIII.       OPENING  THE  CRATERS          .          .          .          .          .          .          .220 

Areas  of  the  Open  Mine  Surfaces  in  1888.  The  Progress  of 
Mining.  Hauling  Ground  in  Raw-hide  Buckets  by  Means  of 
Windlasses.  The  First  Whim.  The  Introduction  of  Aerial 
Gears  and  Trucks.  The  Falls  of  Reef  into  the  Open  Mines. 
The  Flooding  of  the  Mines,  May,  1874.  Shafts  sunk  in  the 
Open  Mine  (Kimberley).  Shafts  sunk  outside  the  Areas  of  the 
Mines.  The  Extraction  of  Diamonds  from  the  Yellow  and  Blue 
Ground.  Hand  Machines.  Horse-power  Machines.  Steam 
Washing  Gears.  Diamond  Stealing  and  Illicit  Diamond  Buying. 

IX.      THE  MOVING  MEN 267 

Barney  Barnato.  Cecil  John  Rhodes.  The  Race  for  Supremacy 
—  De  Beers  versus  Kimberley  Mine.  The  Combinations  of 
Claims.  Rhodes'  Plans  for  acquiring  Territory  in  the  Interior  of 
Africa.  How  Amalgamation  of  the  Mines  was  brought  about. 
Mr.  Alfred  Beit  joins  Rhodes. 


CONTENTS  ix 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

X.      THE  ESSENTIAL  COMBINATION         .          .          .          .          .          .297 

The  Formation  of  De  Beers  Consolidated  Mines,  Limited.  The 
Cost  of  Properties.  The  Improved  Output  of  Diamond-bearing 
Ground.  The  Reconstruction  of  the  Company,  1901. 

XI.       SYSTEMATIC  MINING     ........      307 

Failure  of  First  Methods  of  Underground  Mining.  The  Various 
Systems.  Incline  Shafts.  Vertical  Shafts.  The  Present  System 
of  Mining.  Winding  Shafts.  Skips.  Record  Hoisting.  Drain- 
ing. Lighting  the  Mines.  Electrical  Equipment.  Temperatures 
Underground.  Output  of  Blue  Ground,  Labor  and  Wages. 
Dutoitspan  and  Bultfontein  Mines.  Premier  Mine.  Jagersfontein 
Mine.  (See  Appendix  IX  for  description  of  new  mines.) 


Illustrations 

VOLUME   I 

PAGE 

The  Koh-i-nur  (Old  Cutting) i 

Diamonds  Photographed  with  the  Roentgen  Rays.      I .    A  Black  Diamond  in 

Gold  Setting.      2.    Ordinary  Window  Glass.      3.    A  Pink  Diamond   .          2 

The  Shah 3 

The  Egyptian    Pascha       .........          4 

The  Polar  Star 8 

The  Hope  Blue 8 

The  Empress  Eugenie        .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .15 

The  Nassak 1 6 

The  Great  Mogul 17 

The  Sancy      .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .25 

The  Koh-i-nur  (Present  Cutting)          .          .          .          .          .          .          .27 

The  Orloff 28 

The  Regent    ...........        29 

The  Florentine          ..........        30 

The  Piggott    ...........        30 

The  Star  of  the  South        .........        30 

Cube  Diamond         .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .31 

Dutch  Ships  of  the  Seventeenth  Century        .          .          .          .          .41,  42,  43 

Dutch  Ships  of  the  Eighteenth  Century          .....   40,  44,  45 

Insiza  Ruins    ..........   48,  49,  50 

Khami  Ruins 51,  52,  53,  54 

Gold  Ornaments  found  in  Ancient  Ruins        .          .          .          .          .          .52 

Zimbabwe  Ruins 55,  56,  57,  58,  59,  60 

The  Old  East  India  House,  Leadenhall  Street,  London    .          .          .          .61 

The  Landing  of  Van  Riebeeck    .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .62 

Portrait  of  Johan  Antonyse  van  Riebeeck       .          .          .          .          .          .63 

Portrait  of  Maria  de  la  Querellerie        .          .          .          .          .          .          .63 

Wine  Cellar,  Groot  Constantia   ........        64 

Vergelegen      ...........        69 

Boschendal 71,  72 

Entrance  to  Boschendal      .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .72 

Botanic  Gardens       .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .  73 

zi 


xii  ILLUSTRATIONS 

PAGE 

Lekkerwijn       ...........        74 

Bien  Donne,  Drakenstein  ........  75»  7^ 

Overmantel  and  Old  Dutch  Relics         .  .  .  .  .  .  -75 

Farm  House,  Klein  Drakenstein  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  -77 

Palmeit  Vallei 77,  80 

A  Wine  Farm  at  Klein  Drakenstein       .          .          .  .  .          .  .78 

Dutch  Farm  House  ..........        79 

Muller's  Farm,  Achter  Paarl 78,  79,  80 

Mooi  Kelder,  Lower  Paarl  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .81 

Plaisis  de  Merle,  Groot  Drakenstein      .  .  .  .  .  .  .81 

Donkerhoek,  Groot  Drakenstein  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .82 

A  Wine  Cellar.      Herd  of  Cape  Goats  .  .  .          .  .  .82 

Tatr,  1757 83 

An  Old  Farm  House,  Lower  Paarl       .......        84 

Farm  House,  Achter  Paarl  ........        84 

Brand  Solder 85 

Cape  Cart       .          .          .          . 85,  276 

The  Gate  of  the  Castle 86 

Fort  Good  Hope      ..........        86 

Zulu  Chief  Cetawayo  and  Part  of  his  Family  .....        92 

Zulu  Prince  Dinizulu          .........        93 

Zulu  Family    ...........        93 

A  Zulu  and  his  Ten  Wives          ........        94 

Zulu  Kraal  and  Huts          .  .  .  .  .          .  .  .  -95 

Zulu  Hut  in  course  of  Construction     .......        96 

Zulu  Woman  grinding  Corn        ........        97 

Zulu  Women  ..........        98 

Zulus  smoking  Indian  Hemp        ........        99 

Old  Zulu  Women  taking  Kafir  Beer  to  a  Wedding  ....        99 

Zulu  Girls 100 

Native  Laborers  in  War  Dress    .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .      IOI 

Trekbok  (Springbok)  Hunting    .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .102 

Zulu  in  War  Dress  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .103 

Zulu — Jim  Cameel  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .105 

A  Zulu  Laborer  in  War  Attire    .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .108 

Nest  of  Social  Grosbeak     .  .  .  .  .  .  .          .  .112 

Native  Carvings        .........        112-113 

Moshesh          . .  I  1 3 

John  O'  Reilly 1 20 

Mr.  Lorenzo  Boyes  .  .  .          .  .  .  .  .  .121 

Dr.  W.  Guybon  Atherstone 121 


ILLUSTRATIONS  xiii 


Pniel  Diggings 139 

Delport's  Hope,  Vaal  River  Diggings  .          .          .          .          .          .          .142 

Diggers'  Camps  on  the  Vaal  River       .          .          .          .          .          .          .143 

River  Diggings  at  Gong  Gong,  1880   .  .  .  .          .          .  .147 

Vaal  River  Diggings  .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .149 

River  Diggings,  Waldek's  Plant 151 

Pniel  Diggings,  Vaal  River          .  .  .  .  .          .          .          .152 

Klip-drift,  Early  River  Diggings 152 

Gong  Gong    .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .          •      r  5  3 

Washing  Diamond  Gravel  by  Machinery  at  Gong  Gong,  1880  .          .      155 

Lightning  at  Kimberley       .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .156 

Day  View,  Same  Scene     .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .156 

Largest  River  Diamond  ever  found  in  South  Africa.  .  .  .  .158 

Views  of  Klip-drift .          .162 

Klip- drift  from  Pniel,  showing  the  Ferry        ....   between  162-163 

A  Digger's  Camp,  New  Rush     ......  between  168—169 

Main  Street,  New  Rush,  January,  1872        ....   between  168-169 

Kimberley,  1872  .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .169 

Mrs.  Ravvstorne        .  .  .  .  .          .  .          .          .  .173 

Mr.  T.  B.  Kisch     .          .          . 174 

Kimberley  Mine  just  after  the  Discovery,  July,  1871        .          .          .       175,  176 
Fleetwood  Rawstorne         .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .177 

Native  Chiefs  .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .179 

The  First  Government  House  of  the  Colony  of  Griqualand  West       .          .180 
Sir  Richard  Southey's  Residence,  Kimberley.          .          .          .          .          .181 

Stephen  J.  Paul  Kruger      .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .185 

Coach  leaving  Kimberley  for  the  Coast,  1875          .          .          .          .  .187 

Kimberley,  before  the  Discovery  of  Diamonds          .          .          .          .          .      1 90 

Dutoitspan      .          .          . 191,  192 

Kimberley,  1873 J93 

Around  Kimberley  Mine,  1872  .          .          .          .          .          .        194-195 

Kimberley  Mine,  1872 197,  203,  205 

Beginning  of  Staging,  Colesberg  Kopje,  August,  1872       .  .    between  198-199 

Back  View  from  North  Stagings,  Colesberg  Kopje  .          .   between  198-199 

Centre  Block,  Kimberley  Mine,  1873  .  .  .  .  .      200 

The  Roadways,  Kimberley  Mine,  1871-1872 202 

Roads  in  Kimberley  Mine,  1871-1872 204,207 

Market  Square,  Kimberley  .  .  .  .  .  .  .211,  212 

Natives  resting,  on  their  Way  to  the  Mines    .  .  .  .          .  .217 

Herbert  Rhodes 219 

The  Breaking  up  of  the  Roads,  Kimberley  Mine,  1872    .          .          .          .221 


xiv  ILLUSTRATIONS 

PAGE 

Miners  going  to  Work        .........      222 

Interior  of"  Old  De  Beers  Mine,  1873  •  ...    between  222-223 

The  Hand  Drums  used  for  Winding-up  the  Blue  Ground  .          .          .223 

De  Beers  Mine,  1874        .          .          .  .          .          .          .223 

Kimberley  Mine,  1873      .........      224 

Interior  of  Mine  with  Tramway,  Colesberg  Kopje,  September,  1873 

between  224-225 

View  from  Bottom  of  Kimberley  Mine,  September,  1873  .   between  224—225 

Kimberley  Mine,  1874      .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .225 

Kimberley  Mine,  1875      .........      225 

Natives  carrying  Ground  out  of  Dutoitspan  in  Buckets       ....      226 

Back  View  of  the  Staging  with  Grooved  Wheels,  at  Kimberley  .          .          .226 
Kimberley  Mine,  1875  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .      227 

Snow  in  Kimberley  Mine,  June  21,  1876      ......      228 

Method  of  Hauling,  De  Beers  Mine,   1873    ......      228 

The  First  Horse  Whim,  Kimberley  Mine,  1874     .....      229 

Hauling  Gear  and  Jumpers,  Kimberley  Mine,  1878  .  .  .  .229 

A  Nook  in  Kimberley  Mine,  1874       .......      230 

A  Section  of  De  Beers  Mine,  1874      .....    between  230—231 

The  Horse  Whims,  Kimberley  Mine,  1875  .          .          .          .          .          .231 

Hauling  Gear,  Dutoitspan  Mine,  1876  .  ....      232 

Surface  Loading  Boxes        .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .233 

Aerial  Trams  and  Surface  Chutes,  De  Beers  Mine,  1885  .          .          .233 

Hauling  Gear,  Kimberley  Mine,  1885  ......      234 

The  French  Company's  Sling  Gear,   1885.  .  .  .  .  .235 

Loading  Tubs  at  Bottom  of  Kimberley  Mine,  1885  ....      236 

The  Standard  Company's  Claim,  Bottom  of  Kimberley  Mine,  1885   .          .      237 
Bottom  of  Dutoitspan  Mine  Open  Workings.          .          .          .          .          .238 

Pumping  Engine  in  Kimberley  Mine,  1875  ......      239 

Incline  Tramway  for  Hauling  Reef,  1878      ......      240 

Hauling  Reef,  Kimberley  Mine,   1875  ......      241 

Reef  Falls,  Kimberley  Mine,  1881        .          .          .          .          .          .          .      242 

Steam  Pumping  Engine,  De  Beers  Mine,  1879        .....      243 

The  Central  Company's  Shaft,  Kimberley  Mine,  1885    ....      244 

The  Bottom  of  Kimberley  Mine,  1885  ......      245 

Plan  of  Kimberley  Mine,   1883.  .  .  .  .  .  .  .      246 

Reef  Slips,  Kimberley  Mine,  1874       .......      247 

Kimberley  Mine,  showing  how  the  Ground  cracked  before  Subsidence  .      247 

The  Central  Company's  Atkins  Shaft   .......      248 

The  Last  of  Open  Working,  Kimberley  Mine,  1889        .  249 

R.  D.  Atkins  .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .250 


ILLUSTRATIONS  xv 

PAGE 

No.  2  Incline  Shaft,  De  Beers  Mine    .          .          .          .          .          .          .251 

Eldorado  Road,  Dutoitspan  Mine,  1874        .          .          .          .          .          .251 

Claims  in  Dutoitspan  Mine          .  .  .  .  .          .          .  .252 

Bultfontein  Mine,  1879     .........      253 

The  First  Rotary  Washing  Machine     .          .          .          .          .          .          .254 

Another  Early  Washing  Machine,  1874         .          .          .          .          .          -255 

Horse-power  Washing  Machine,  1875  .  .  .          .          .  .255 

Early  Horse-power  Washing  Machine,  1874  .....      256 

The  First  Washing  Machine  with  Elevator  to  carry  away  the  Tailings  .      257 

Washing  Gear,  Bultfontein  Mine  .          .          .          .          .          .          .258 

Steam  Washing  Gear,  Kimberley  Mine          .          .          .          .          .          .259 

Webb's  Washing  Machine,  1878          .......      260 

Cape  of  Good  Hope  Company's  Washing  Gear,  1878     ....      261 

Washing  Gear,  Dutoitspan  Mine  .......      262 

Washing  Gear,  Bultfontein  Mine,  1878         ......      263 

Mr.  Barney  Barnato  .........      268 

C.  J.  Rhodes,  when  a  Student  at  Oxford       ......      272 

Sorting  the  Ground  for  Diamonds          .....   between  274—275 

J.  Dick-Lauder's  Camp,  1872    .          .          .          .          .          .   between  274—275 

Silver  Trees    ...........      275 

Mr.  C.  D.  Rudd 279 

Mr.  Robert  English  .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .279 

Plan  of  Kimberley  Mine,  1882 282 

House  of  Parliament,  Cape  Town        .          .          .          .          .          .          .284 

Avenue  of  Oaks,  Cape  Town     .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .285 

Mr.  Carl  Meyer 287 

Mr.  Alfred  Beit 289 

The  Diamond  Market,  Kimberley,  1875        .          •          •          •          •          •      29° 
The  Right  Honorable  Cecil  John  Rhodes,  and  Alfred  Beit,  Esq.,  October, 

1901       ...........      292 

Fac-simile  of  Cheque  given  in  Payment  for  Kimberley  Mine       .          .          .      295 
A  De  Beers  Group  ..........      300 

Group   of  Life   Governors,    Directors,    General    Manager,    and    Secretary, 

De  Beers  Mine          .........      303 

Mr.  E.  R.  Tymms .306 

The  Last  of  Open  Mining,  Kimberley  Mine  .....      308 

Plan  of  De  Beers  Mine       .......        309,  316,  318 

Section  through  De  Beers  Mine   .          .          -.          .          .          .          .      3 1  o,  3  1 1 

Plan  of  Kimberley  Mine    .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .312 

Kimberley  Open  Mine,  looking  South,  January,  1 904      .  .   between  3 1  2—3 1 3 

Kimberley  Open  Mine,  looking  South,  January,  1904      .          .  between  312-313 


xvi  ILLUSTRATIONS 

PAGE 

Section  of  Kimberley  Mine          .          .          .          .          .          .          .  3 1 3 

Kimberley  Open  Mine,  looking  South,  January,  1904      .          .   between  314-315 
Bottom  of  Kimberley  Mine,  January,  1904   .  .          .  between  314-315 

Sketch  of  Premier  Mine     . 318 

Stoping  ...  .          .  ..      319,  320 

Timbering  Tunnels  .  .  .  .  .  •  •          .  .321,  322 

Natives  drilling,  De  Beers  Mine  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .322 

Details  of  Sets  for  Rock  Shaft 323 

A  Shaft  Station          .  .  .  .  .  .          .  .          .  .324 

Loading  the  Trucks  .  .  .  .  .  .  .          .  .  •      325 

Loading  Chutes  for  Rock  Shaft    .  .  .  .  .          .  .          .326 

Plan  of  Skip  for  Six  Loads  .  .  .  .  .  .          .          .327 

Main  Shaft,  Kimberiey  Mine       . 328 

The  Rock  Shaft,  De  Beers  Mine 329 

Vertical  Tandem  Compound-condensing  Winding  Engines          .          .       330*  33 1 
Winding  Engine,  Kimberley  Mine        .  .  .  .  .  .  .332 

Mr.  Louis  I.  Seymour        .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .332 

Plan  of  Bultfontein  Mine   .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  -333 

Dutoitspan  Open  Mine  Flooded,  April,  1903          .          .          .  between  334-335 
Kimberley  Open  Mine,  looking  North,  January,  1904     .          .   between  338—339 
Mount  Ararat  before  Blasting       ........      342 

Dutoitspan  Mine,   1885     .          .          .          .          .          .          .   between  242—243 

Shots  fired       ...........      343 

A  Second  after  Firing          .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .344 

The  Mine  filled  with  Smoke        ........      345 

After  the  Smoke  has  cleared  away          .  .  .  .  .  .  .346 

Premier  Mine,  Open  Workings  ........      348 

Premier  Mine  Shaft  ........   between  348-349 

Premier  Mine  ........        350,  351,  353 

Premier  Mine,  1903          .          .          .          .          .          .          .   between  354—355 

One  of  the  Early  Washing  Machines    .  .  .  .  .  .  .354 

Washing  Plant,  Standard  Company,  Kimberley  Mine,   1888      .  .  .      355 

No.  I  Washing  Plant,  De  Beers  Floors  .  .  .  .  .  .356 

No.  2  Washing  Plant,  De  Beers  Floors  .....       357,  370 

Excelsior  Diamond   .          .          .          .          .          .          .          .  35 8,  359 

Plan  and  Section,  Jagersfontein  Mine    .....  between  358—359 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


xvn 


MAPS 

Waldseemuller's  Map  of  Africa,  A.D.   1507    . 

Visscher's  Map  of  Africa,  1662,  reproduced  by  Blaeuw 

Visscher's  Map  of  Africa,  published  A.D.  1662 

Blaeuw's  Map  of  Africa,  published  1665 

Outline  Copy  of  the  Catalan  Mappermonde,  1375 

Outline  Copy  of  the  Map  of  Portolano  Laurenziano,  1351 

Edrisi's  Map,  A.D.   1154 

Andrea  Bianco' s  Map,  A.D.  1436,  Venice     . 

Africa  de  Mappermonde,  Juan  de  la  Cosa,  I  500 

Chart  showing  Method  of  Surveying  Coast  Lines     . 

Map  showing  Position  of  Ancient  Ruins  in  Rhodesia         . 

Kimberley  Mine,  1877      . 

General  Plan  of  the  Diamond  Mines  owned  by  De  Beers 


PAGE 

between  32—33, 
33 
34 

between  34—35 

36-37 
.        38 

between  38—39 
between  38-39 

39 
.         .       46 

•       47 

between  276—277 
between  316-317 


PHOTOGRAVURES 


Portrait  of  Gardner  F.  Williams  ..... 

Farmhouse  on  the  Farm  Groot  Constantia,  near  Cape  Town 

La  Rhone,  Groot  Drakenstein  ) 

Old  Le  Roux  .          .      ) 

A  View  from  the  Kloof  Road  leading  from  the  Upper  Part  of  Cape  Town    . 

Zulu  in  War  Attire 

The  Homestead  of  the  Farm  Vooruitzigt  on  which  are  De  Beers  and  Kim- 
berley Mines  .......... 

Portrait  of  Sir  Richard  Southey    ........ 

Natives  seeking  Work         ......... 

Kimberley  Mine,  1872..          .          .          .          .          . 

Kimberley  Mine  flooded,  May,  1874 

Kimberley  Mine,  1886      ......... 

Bultfontein  Mine,  1878     ......... 

Portrait  of  Cecil  John  Rhodes      ........ 

Barnato's  Turnout    .......... 

A  Group  of  De  Beers  Directors,  etc. ,  etc.      ...... 

Premier  Mine,  looking  from  Workings  up  through  Incline  where  the  Blue 
Ground  is  hauled  ......... 

Premier  Mine 


FACING  PAGE 

Frontispiece 
.        64 


82 

86 
94 

172 

1 80 
188 
196 
240 
246 
252 
272 
296 
298 

344 
352 


-*:-" 

5? 

-rue 


UNIVERSITY 


The  Diamond  Mines  of  South  Africa 


.<.  i 


^DAMAS 

[T  the  beginning  of  the  last  century,  w! 
blinded   Shah-Shuja  sought   refuge  in   f 
of  the  "  Lion  of  the  Punjaub,"  Runjec 
his  chief  treasure  was  the  crystal  r<- 
Nadir  Shah  had  snatched  from  the 
last  of  the  Great  Moguls. 
For  the  sake  of  the  pebble,  Runjeet  starved  r  and 

children  of  his  friend  until  he  was  driven  to  <h-i-nur 

at  the  feet  of  his  host.  "  At  what 
price  do  you  value  it  ? "  said  the 
Lion,  showing  his  teeth  in  a  grim 
smile. 

"At  good  luck,"  replied  the 
blind  Shah,  "for  it  has  eve. 
the  bosom  companion  of  him  v 
numphed  over  his  eneni 
It  may   have  been  the  tradi- 
tional  talisman   of  Carna,   Rajah       We!ght  before 
of  Anga,    fighting   in    legendary          ^-sght^er  first  cutting,  i86t  canus ; 

present  weight,  106  carats. 

wars,  hundreds  of  years  before  the  great  Achilles  st 
sulked   under  the  walls   of  Troy.1 
appearance  it  had  been  so  coveted 


Indian  History,"  J.  Talboys 

the    government   of  India   in   the  Foreign   Departmei 
Great  Diamonds  of  the  World,"  Edwin  W.  Streeter. 


UNIVERSITY 

i 
• 


The  Diamond  Mines  of  South  Africa 


CHAPTER   I 

THE    ANCIENT    ADAMAS 

T  the  beginning  of  the  last  century,  when  the 
blinded  Shah-Shuja  sought  refuge  in  the  lair 
of  the  "  Lion  of  the  Punjaub,"  Runjeet  Singh, 
his  chief  treasure  was  the  crystal  pebble  which 
Nadir  Shah  had  snatched  from  the  head  of  the 
last  of  the  Great  Moguls. 
For  the  sake  of  the  pebble,  Runjeet  starved  the  wife  and 
children  of  his  friend  until  he  was  driven  to  lay  the  Koh-i-nur 
at  the  feet  of  his  host.  "  At  what 
price  do  you  value  it  ? "  said  the 
Lion,  showing  his  teeth  in  a  grim 
smile. 

"At  good  luck,"  replied  the 
blind  Shah,  "  for  it  has  ever  been 
the  bosom  companion  of  him  who 
has  triumphed  over  his  enemies." 

It  may  have  been  the  tradi- 
tional talisman  of  Carna,  Rajah 
of  Anga,  fighting  in  legendary  The  Koh-i-nfir.  (Old  Cutting.) 

wars,  hundreds  of  years  before  the  great  Achilles  stormed  and 
sulked  under  the  walls  of  Troy.1  From  its  earliest  known 
appearance  it  had  been  so  coveted  that  agas  and  sultans  and 

1  "Tales  from  Indian  History,"  ].  Talboys  Wheeler,  assistant  secretary  of 
the  government  of  India  in  the  Foreign  Department,  Calcutta,  1 88 1  ;  "The 
Great  Diamonds  of  the  World,"  Edwin  W.  Streeter. 


THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


. 


rajahs  and  shahs  had  snatched  it  in  the  first  spoils  of  victory, 
or  tried  to  extort  it  by  starvation  or  blinding  or  boiling  oil  or 
some  other  device  of  torture ;  and  the  adventurous  and  blood- 
stained career  of  this  famous  diamond  is  only  one  of  many  like 

passages,  for  every  precious 
stone  of  renown  has  a  trail 
like  a  meteor.  Some  have 
gleamed  weirdly  in  the  eye- 
sockets  of  idols  in  Indian 
temples  or  flashed  from 
the  splendid  thrones  of 
emperors,  or  glittered  in 
golden  basins  amid  gems 
of  every  hue  heaped  up  in 
tribute,  or  sparkled  on  the 
crests  of  warriors,  the  tur- 
bans of  rajahs,  the  breasts 
of  begums,  and  the  san- 
dals of  courtesans.  To 
win  them  temples  have  been  profaned,  palaces  looted,  thrones 
torn  to  fragments,  princes  tortured,  women  strangled,  guests 
poisoned  by  their  hosts,  and  slaves  disembowelled.  Some  have 
fallen  on  battlefields,  to  be  picked  up  by  ignorant  freebooters 
and  sold  for  a  few  silver  coins,  and  others  have  been  cast  into 
ditches  by  thieves  or  swallowed  by  guards,  or  sunk  in  ship- 
wrecks, or  broken  to  powder  in  moments  of  frenzy.  No  strain 
of  fancy  in  an  Arabian  tale  has  outstripped  the  marvels  of  fact 
in  the  diamond's  history. 

Among  all  the  stones  that  our  world's  fancy  holds  precious, 
the  diamond  stands  preeminent.  It  is  pure  crystallized  carbon. 
It  crystallizes  in  almost  all  the  forms  of  the  isometric  system, 
commonly  the  octahedral  or  dodecahedral,  and  frequently  with 
curved  faces.1  Two  pyramids  with  triangular  sides  and  a 


i.  A  Black  Diamond  in  Gold  Setting.  2.  Ordinary 
Window  Glass.  3.  A  Pink  Diamond.  (Photo- 
graphed with  the  Roentgen  Rays.) 


1  The  South  African  diamonds  differ  in  appearance  from  those  found  in  India 
or   Brazil.      They  are  brighter,  and  for  the  most  part  without  any  incrustation,  and 


•KNT   ADAMAS 


common  base  make  uj  ahedron.     The  dodecahedron  has 

twelve  rhombs  or  natur  lozenge  shape. 


It  is  the  most  impel 
edge  of  one  of  its  • 
or  the  hardest  steel.      1 
It  refracts  entering  ray: 
stance  except  crocoite, 


tints,  but  it 
persion  are 


t  all  known  substances,  for  the 
itch  the  face  of  any  other  stone 
most  perfect  reflector  of  light. 
•ian  any  other  translucent  sub- 
Chrysolite  alone 
:ht  into  rainbow 
ion,  and  dis- 
color in  its 

crystalline  hearr  flashing  int  fire. 

It  may  be  a  and  col  lew,  or 

.iry  colors,  such  as  red,  ow, 

•  ;  so  that,  as  John  Mandeville  qua; 
.  to  take  pleasure  in  assuming  in  turn  the  i. 
to  other  ger  It  is  highly  phosphorescent.    Even  the 

of  diamonds  are  transparent  to  the  X-rays.     No  acid  will 
no  solvent  will  dissolve  it.    Its  brilliance  is  undecaying,  a 
might  roll  by  without  rubbing  the  minutest  partic! 
mantine  face.    The  diamond  that  gleamed  fire 

in  an  idol's  eye  before  the  rising  of  the  be 

sparkling  to-day  with  more  dazzling 
radiance  in  the  crown  of  an  emperor. 
Koh-i-nur  and  Darya-i-nur  and 
e-mah  and   Regent  and  OrlofV 


.nd  Shah  will  shine  n< 
vere 
cm  shall  be 


Present  weight,  05  carats. 


any,   are  visible  in   their  natura 
Dufrc        / 


)r 


A*  RICA 


in  tne  nr->    spons  of  victory, 
MI  or  blinding  or  boiling  oil   or 
and   the  adventurous  and  blood- 
Lliamond    s  only  one  of  many  like 
passages,  for  every  precious 
stone  of  renown  has  a  trail 
like  a  meteor.     Some  have 
gleamed  weirdly  in  the  eye- 
sockets  of  idols  in   Indian 
temples    or    flashed    from 
rhe    splendid    thrones    of 
iprrors,  or   glittered    in 
basins  amid   gems 
Hie  heaped  up  in 
sparkled  on  the 
vrtors,  the  tur- 
b;i>  jhs,  rhv?  breasts 

lit  VK!    the  san- 

dals -urte-sans.       To 

led,  pahucs    looted,  throi\es 
,    women    strangled,   guests 
isembowe'led.      Some   have 
Lip   S>    iancrant  freebooters 
nthi"^   nav?    been  cast  into 
euar,,L,   nr   sunk   in   ship- 
No  strain 
,.  ••,:    -he   marvels  ot  fact 


.   holds  precious, 

*  "fallr/ed  carbon. 

I   the  isometric  system, 

ai,  :iru{   frequently  with 

•lanLrula"    sides    and    a 

ci-   tier.:    :li',~e  fnunci    ii*    India 
vviihi ••':  ;unr  incTii^riii(^n,  and 


i  a  ?,  a  v  *  n  u 


THE    ANCIENT   ADAMAS  3 

common  base  make  up  the  octahedron.  The  dodecahedron  has 
twelve  rhombs  or  natural  facets  of  lozenge  shape. 

It  is  the  most  impenetrable  of  all  known  substances,  for  the 
edge  of  one  of  its  facets  will  scratch  the  face  of  any  other  stone 
or  the  hardest  steel.  It  is  the  most  perfect  reflector  of  light. 
It  refracts  entering  rays  more  than  any  other  translucent  sub- 
stance except  crocoite,  the  chromate  of  lead.1  Chrysolite  alone 
exceeds  its  dispersive  power  to  dissolve  white  light  into  rainbow 
tints,  but  its  combined  powers  of  reflection,  refraction,  and  dis- 
persion are  unmatched.2  Hence  appears  the  play  of  color  in  its 
crystalline  heart  and  the  resplendent  flashing  of  its  radiant  fire. 
It  may  be  as  purely  transparent  and  colorless  as  a  drop  of  dew,  or 
it  may  display  all  the  primary  colors,  such  as  red,  orange,  yellow, 
blue,  and  violet;  so  that,  as  John  Mandeville  quaintly  observed, 
"  It  seems  to  take  pleasure  in  assuming  in  turn  the  colors  proper 
to  other  gems."  It  is  highly  phosphorescent.  Even  the  blackest 
of  diamonds  are  transparent  to  the  X-rays.  No  acid  will  mar  it, 
no  solvent  will  dissolve  it.  Its  brilliance  is  undecaying,  and  ages 
might  roll  by  without  rubbing  the  minutest  particle  from  its  ada- 
mantine face.  The  diamond  that  gleamed  with  such  strange  fire 
in  an  idol's  eye  before  the  rising  of  the  Star  of  Bethlehem  may  be 
sparkling  to-day  with  more  dazzling 
radiance  in  the  crown  of  an  emperor. 
Koh-i-nur  and  Darya-i-nur  and  Taj- 
e-mah  and  Regent  and  Orloff  and 
Sancy  and  Shah  will  shine  no  less  re- 
splendent when  the  sovereigns  that 
now  treasure  them  shall  be  dust.  The  shah. 

the  imperfections,  if  any,  are  visible  in  their  natural  state.  See  note,  p.  3 1 ,  in 
reference  to  cube  diamonds. 

l" Table  of  Indices  of  Refraction,"  Dufrenoy,  p.  87.  "Treatise  on  Gems," 
Feuchtwanger,  New  York,  1867. 

2 "  Table  of  the  Distinguishing  Characteristics  of  Gems,"  Feuchtwanger, 
pp.  494—499.  "Optical  Properties  of  the  Diamond,"  Sir  David  Brewster, 
Phil.  Trans.,  VIII,  157,  1817. 

3  '«  Le  Grand  Lapidaire,"  Paris,  1561. 


4          THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF    SOUTH    AFRICA 

"  With  the  point  of  a  diamond,"  Jeremiah  (B.C.  600)  says,1 
records  were  graven  when  stones  were  writing-tablets ;  but, 
unfortunately  for  our  knowledge,  the  diamond  did  not  tell  its 
own  story  ;  and  it  is,  at  best,  a  groping  effort  that  would  search 
out  the  rising  of  this  gem  through  the  mists  of  tradition. 

"  Thou  hast  been  in  Eden,  the  garden  of  God ;  every 
precious  stone  was  thy  covering,  the  sardius,  topaz,  and  the 
diamond,  the  beryl,  the  onyx,  and  the  jasper,  the  sapphire, 
the  emerald,  and  the  carbuncle.  Thou  wast  upon  the  holy 
mountain  of  God;  thou  hast  walked  up  and  down  in  the  midst 
of  the  stones  of  fire."2 

How  glowing  are  the  words  of  the  Prophet  of  the  Captivity, 
declaring  the  vainglory  forerunning  the  doom  of  Tyre's  princes 

and  people  (588  B.C.).  Did  the  three 
rivers  of  Eden  flow  through  sands  glit- 
tering with  stones  of  fire  ?  Did  the  eating 
of  a  little  green  apple  from  the  tree  of 
knowledge  open  the  eyes  of  the  first 
woman  of  earth  to  the  lure  of  the  gems 
that  are  now  so  tempting  to  every  daugh- 
ter of  Eve  ?  If  not,  how  long  was  it 

The  Egyptian  Pascha.  before     ^     ^^    ^    tfo     Diamond,    the 

emerald  and  the  ruby  and  the  sapphire  were  added  to  the  fig- 
leaf  covering  of  our  first  parents  ? 

Multicycles  of  refining  are  needed  for  a  clear  perception  of 
beauty.  The  aboriginal  Adams  and  Eves  did  not  have  it.  The 
children  of  the  twentieth  century  will  open  their  eyes  to  its 
light  more  quickly  than  those  of  the  Stone  Age,  because  the 
children  of  to-day  inherit  the  quickened  sense  of  unnumbered 
generations,  and  are  taught  to  trace  the  range  of  beauty  in 
nature  and  art.  Prehistoric  man,  a  weakling  in  perception, 
turned  his  eyes  to  the  grand  orb  of  the  sun,  rising  above  the 
horizon  and  flooding  the  earth  with  its  rays,  to  the  pale  bow 

1  Jeremiah  xvii. 

2  Ezekiel  xxviii.   13    and    14  (588   B.C.).      Babylonian  captivity  of  the  Jews 
(588-537  B.C.). 


THE   ANCIENT  ADAMAS 


of  the  moon  and  the  ng  of  the  firmament  of  stars, 

the  ceaseless   surge   of  tb  n   and  the   mountain   sumi 


wreathed  in  clouds,-— 
of  nature,  —  before  h 
the  petty  circle 
animal  wants 
by  before  the  s;i 
ing  pebbles 
and  the  f 
Any  o; 


grander  aspects  and  moti 
drawn  to  lesser  things  outside 
and  the  sating  of  his  crude 
TS  of  brutal  life  rolled 
one  of  the  gleam- 
^ith  bounding  foot 
r's  bank. 


as  another's, 

what  lir  or 

the 

idoubtedly  found  on  the  fa 
arisome  digging  or  quarrying,  as  they 
ing  in  the  gravel,  washed  from  hillsides  over  th 
the  courses  of  rivers  swelled  by  floods  and 
ings  of  the  earth's  crust  to  the  sea.     Thou 
garnets,    jasper,    amethysts,    sapphires,    rubi 
were  picked  up,  maybe  by  children  rummag 
or  the  clefts  of  rocks,  and  thrown  away  a 
of  flint,  before  one  was  preserved  and  pri. 

Is  were  much  easier  to  collect  anci 
and  rude  armlets  and  leg-bands  of  * 
were  easily  forged,  and  more  to  th 
of  stones.1 

When  some  of  the  j:  stones  v 

:r  beds  ,  of  gra 

owers  attrib 
hardness,  ar 
i 


Hi-     !>!-\\;>iM>    MINKS    OK    SOUTH    AFRICA 


>V:-h    -he    pu:nt  of  a  diamond,"  Jeremiah  'B.C.  600)  says,1 

ds    *cre    Craven    '\hen    stones    wen:  writing-tablets;    but, 

tunareiy  tor  our   knowledge,  the  diamond   did   not  tell  its 

and  ir  is,  at   best,  a  groping  erFo1      'at  would  search 

,'K-  r'->ma  of  this  sein  through  the  mist--,  oi  tradition. 

1'ho-.;    hast    b>-en    in    Kden,    riv     £;natn    of   God;    every 

us   siont   WHS   thy    covering    tiie  s,   topaz,  and    the 

>ri(i,   rhc    be^-vl,   the    onyx,    and    :h<*   Kipper,    the    sapphire, 

niotuid.   uivl    :iu    caibuncle.        Thyu   wast  upon  the   holy 

itair;   of  f .»(.-'  ;   Hiou  hast  wulkcti  u     and  down  in  the  midst 


word-  <>.-          Prophet  of  rhe  Captivity, 

:orerunnm-j      ••_•  doom  of    Tyre's  princes 

H.r.i.      Did    the   three 

,  of  h-  -'--ugh  sands  glit- 

Did  the  eating 

"'n   the  tree  of 

of    the    first 

,  .'man  of  r.iith  i    :e  t>t   the  gems 

hat  .i;v  iH>u,   -     reruj^  :>J  t'1  everv  dau^h- 

LI;W  long  was  it 
'\<A.'.  '  the  «iiamond,  the 
Irtlfcg  were  :idded  to  the  fig- 

td  fnr  a  clear  perception  of 

;  I  <es  did  not  have  it.     The 

their   eyes  to  its 

\!j;e,  because  the 

ot   unnumbered 

;hc    range    of  beauty   in 

i  in    perception, 

'he  sun,  rising  above  the 

•  ir'h       "h    its   r.iys,  to  the   pale  bow 


of  the  Jews 


THE   ANCIENT  ADAMAS  5 

of  the  moon  and  the  sparkling  of  the  firmament  of  stars,  to 
the  ceaseless  surge  of  the  ocean  and  the  mountain  summits 
wreathed  in  clouds,  —  to  all  the  grander  aspects  and  motions 
of  nature,  —  before  his  eyes  were  drawn  to  lesser  things  outside 
the  petty  circle  of  his  rambling  and  the  sating  of  his  crude 
animal  wants.  Mayhap  thousands  of  years  of  brutal  life  rolled 
by  before  the  savage  stooped  to  pick  up  any  one  of  the  gleam- 
ing pebbles  which  the  fierce  tiger  spurned  with  bounding  foot 
and  the  flying  deer  trampled  heedlessly  on  the  river's  bank. 

Any  one  may  guess,  and  any  one's  guess  is  as  good  as  another's, 
what  little  pebble  first  drew  the  glance  of  the  barbarian's  eye  or 
the  stoop  of  the  rover's  knee.  The  first-known  precious  stones 
of  the  world  were  undoubtedly  found  on  the  face  of  the  ground, 
without  any  wearisome  digging  or  quarrying,  as  they  lay  shin- 
ing in  the  gravel,  washed  from  hillsides  over  the  plains,  or  along 
the  courses  of  rivers  swelled  by  floods  and  sweeping  the  par- 
ings of  the  earth's  crust  to  the  sea.  Thousands  of  carnelians, 
garnets,  jasper,  amethysts,  sapphires,  rubies,  and  diamonds 
were  picked  up,  maybe  by  children  rummaging  in  gravel  beds 
or  the  clefts  of  rocks,  and  thrown  away  as  carelessly  as  splinters 
of  flint,  before  one  was  preserved  and  prized.  White  and  tinted 
shells  were  much  easier  to  collect  and  pierce  and  link  together, 
and  rude  armlets  and  leg-bands  of  copper  and  silver  and  gold 
were  easily  forged,  and  more  to  the  savage  taste  than  any  neck- 
lace of  stones.1 

When  some  of  the  precious  stones  were  lifted  and  borne 
away  from  their  beds  in  drifts  of  gravel,  they  were  valued  first 
chiefly  for  the  mystic  powers  attributed  to  pebbles  of  such  rich 
hues,  phenomenal  hardness,  and  peculiar  lustre.  One  of  them 
would  be  worn  in  a  pouch  next  to  the  bosom  as  an  amulet  or 
charm,  averting  peril,  inspiring  courage,  healing  diseases,  repell- 
ing evil  spirits,  or  winning  the  love  of  scornful  maidens.  Or, 
if  any  one  of  these  magic  stones  was  set  to  gleam  in  the  buckle 
of  a  warrior's  plume,  it  was  less  for  a  show  of  ornament  than  for 

1  "  A  Treatise  on  Diamonds  and  Precious  Stones,"  John  Mawe,  London, 
1813. 


6          THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

its  mystic  shielding  power  and  redoubling  of  valor.  The  tradi- 
tion of  these  virtues  has  passed  from  generation  to  generation, 
and  still  finds  credence  among  the  masses  of  Asia.  The  poor 
natives  of  India  believe  to  this  day  in  the  efficacy  of  sapphires 
and  rubies  in  purifying  the  blood,  strengthening  the  body, 
quenching  thirst,  dispelling  melancholy,  averting  danger,  and 
assuring  honor  and  fortune.  The  emerald  in  their  eyes  is 
potent  to  dispel  bad  dreams,  give  courage,  and  cure  palsies, 
colds,  and  acute  dysentery.  The  turquoise  they  say  will  brighten 
and  heal  weak  and  sore  eyes,  and  serve  as  an  antidote  for  veno- 
mous snake  bites.1  Like  the  other  precious  stones,  the  diamond 
was  early  endowed  by  fancy  with  medical  virtues,  and  particu- 
larly prized  as  a  safeguard  from  madness,  in  its  power  to  "  raze 
out  the  written  troubles  of  the  brain."1  It  was  also  believed  to 
be  potent  to  touch  the  heart,  and  there  is  a  pretty  conceit  that 
the  darts  of  Cupid  were  diamond  tipped.  Perhaps  the  passion 
of  women  for  gems  gave  point  to  this  fiction. 

As  the  diverse  stones  of  fire  became  better  known  and  more 
sharply  distinguished,  special  significance  was  given  to  each  by 
some  nations  of  the  East,  associating  them  with  the  planets, 
the  march  of  the  seasons,  or  with  various  divinities.  Sometimes 
they  were  of  emblematic  service.  For  the  representation  of  the 
twelve  tribes  of  Israel,  twelve  distinct  gems  were  set  in  gold 
plates  on  the  robe  of  the  high-priest.3  When  the  rise  of  letters 
and  the  fine  arts  brought  the  devising  of  symbols  and  graven 
inscriptions,  the  supposed  potency  of  these  stone  amulets  was 
increased  by  the  craft  of  priests  and  sorcerers,  cutting  the  face 
of  the  charms  themselves  or  directing  the  hands  of  expert  work- 

1  "Oriental  Accounts  of  Precious  Minerals,"  Journal  of  Asiatic  Society  of 
Bengal,  August,  1832. 

2  "Treatise  on  Gems,"  Feuchtwanger,  New  York,  1867. 

3  Exodus  xxviii.      "  Natural    History   of  the  Bible,"  Thaddeus  M.    Harris, 
Boston,   1820.      "Precious  Stones  in  their  Scientific  and  Artistic   Relations,"  A. 
H.    Church,    London,     1883.      "  De    Duodecim    Gemmis   in    Veste    Aaronis." 
Epiphanius,  1565.     John  Peter  Lange,  Professor  University  of  Bonn,   in  Schaff's 
"Critical,  Doctrinal,  and  Homiletical  Commentary"  on  the  Bible. 


THE   ANCIENT  ADAMAS  7 

men.  The  Chaldeans  are  especially  charged  with  the  fomenting 
of  superstitions  by  the  exaggeration  of  this  conceit.  These 
engraved  stones  served  often  as  distinctive  seals,  and  for  con- 
venience in  carrying  and  the  gratification  of  a  spreading  taste  for 
such  ornaments,  the  talismans  were  set  in  rings  and  clasps.  So 
Solomon's  seal,  summoning  and  mastering  genii,  was  the  wonder 
of  legends,  and  so,  too,  the  famous  ring  of  Polycrates  and  the 
rival  marvels  of  Oriental  romancers  familiar  in  the  tales  of  the 
"  Arabian  Nights." 

As  time  and  art  disclosed  more  and  more  of  the  marvels  of 
the  stones  of  fire  in  the  crust  of  the  earth,  the  wonder  grew  and 
the  supernatural  potency  of  the  various  gems  was  more  deeply 
impressed.  Thus  we  reach  the  belief  and  tribute  of  the  priest 
Onomacritus  (500  B.C.),  who  declared  of  the  lucent  crystal, 
"  Whoso  goes  into  the  temple  with  this  in  his  hand  may  be 
sure  of  having  his  prayer  granted,  as  the  gods  cannot  withstand 
its  power."  Its  use  to  concentrate  the  sun's  rays  as  a  burning 
glass  was  highly  prized  also  in  priestly  ministrations. 

Onomacritus  says  crudely  of  this  use  that  "  when  a  trans- 
parent crystal  is  laid  on  wood,  so  that  the  sun's  rays  may  shine 
upon  it,  there  will  soon  be  seen  smoke,  then  fire,  then  a  bright 
flame."  Fire  kindled  through  this  agency  was  holy  in  the 
sight  of  priests  and  people,  and  no  burnt  offering  was  so  pleas- 
ing to  the  gods  as  one  set  in  these  sacred  flames. 

The  precious  stones  are  so  greatly  dependent  upon  the  ad- 
vance in  the  art  of  polishing  and  cutting  for  the  revelation  of 
their  qualities  and  beauty  that  it  was  doubtless  long  after  their  dis- 
covery before  they  came  into  any  considerable  use  as  ornaments. 
Their  hardness  defied,  at  first,  any  effort  to  fashion  their  shape 
with  primitive  tools.  The  most  that  could  be  effected  was  the 
rude  polish  that  might  be  obtained  by  the  tedious  rubbing  of 
the  face  of  one  stone  against  another.  But,  as  time  went  on, 
the  lines  of  natural  cleavage  were  noted,  and  grinding  wheels 
in  the  hands  of  skilful  artisans  gave  a  smooth  face  to  the  natural 
contours  of  the  softer  stones,  and,  later,  even  to  the  sapphire 

1  "Precious  Stones  and  Gems,"  Streeter. 


8  THE   DIAMOND    MINES    OF    SOUTH    AFRICA 

and  diamond.  With  the  advance  in  art  the  demand  for  precious 
stones  increased  apace,  and,  to  meet  the  demand,  keener  and 
wider  ranging  searches  developed  new  and  greater  supplies. 

There  is  a  certain  tracing  of  the  use  of 
precious  stones  for  ornaments  to  the  ancient 
Babylonian  civilization,  whose  existing  ruins 
extend  back  to  from  6000  to  7000  years  B.C.1 
Babylonian  lapidaries  were  cutting  and  polish- 
ing carnelians,  sards,  onyx,  and  rock  crystals 
before  the  Egyptians  had  advanced  beyond 

The  Polar  Star.  ,  .  r'   \      •  r  •  T-'I 

the  carving  or  their  sort  steatite.  I  hen  the 
Phoenicians  drew  from  all  parts  of  the  known  earth  its  treasures.2 
So  Ezekiel  testifies  of  Tyre :  "  Syria  was  thy  merchant  by 
reason  of  the  multitude  of  wares  of  thy  making :  they  occupied 
in  thy  fairs  with  emeralds,  purple  and  broidered  work  and  fine 
linen  and  coral  and  agate.  The  merchants  of  Sheba  and  Raamah, 
they  were  thy  merchants  :  they  occupied  in  thy  fairs  with  chief 
of  all  spices,  and  with  all  precious  stones,  and  gold." 

Judea  had  some  share  of  this  stream.  The  Queen  of  Sheba 
bore  a  "great  store  of  precious  stones  "  to  Solomon  (B.C.  101 5— 975) 
with  her  tribute  of  gold,4  but  this  was  a 
trivial  trickle  compared  with  the  flow  to 
Phoenicia  and  Babylonia.  Long  before  the 
days  of  the  Captivity  (B.C.  598),5  the  robes 
of  the  princes  and  nobles  of  these  rich  realms 
were  glittering  with  jewels,  and  their  gor- 
geous array  was  the  marvel  of  the  poor  The  Hope  Blue, 
exiles,  crying  with  the  voice  of  their  prophet,  Ezekiel :  "  Every 

1  "  Encyclopedia  of  Religious  Knowledge,"   Schaff-Herzog.      "Archaeology 
of  the   Past   Century,"  Professor  W.   M.  F.   Petrie. 

2  The  Story  of  the  Nations,  "  Phoenicia,"  George  Rawlinson,  M.A. 

3  Ezekiel  xxvii.  22. 

4  "  Old    Testament    History,"    William    Smith.      "Precious    Stones  in   the 
Scriptures,"  R.  Hindmarsh,  London,  1851. 

5  Date  of  removal  of  jehoiachin,  according  to  Prideaux  and  to  Clinton.     Ewald 
makes  the  date  597  B.C. 


THE    A 


precious  stone  was  thy  cove; 
in  the  midst  of  the  stom 
of  Eden  in  the  valk 
den  typical  of  the  s] 

How  th 
of  Eden  or  el; 

its  that 
sprinkling  of 
dug  and 
ing  thro 


Th< 
res, 


.ien 


among   the 


had 
climbing  of  Zulmat  Y 

>le  vali 
rlet  of  t! 


the 

me    n : 

n    in  the  i 


legends,  a 
at  Alex  to  th 

precipice; 
as  no  way  of 
pt   by  fin 

o 

on  the  mountain  wit 


:  this  tale  in  mind  ft 
11   be  remembc 
rt  island  a 
to  the 


A1ISW3AINO 

3HJ. 


1  HK    !;|A.\!(.)M) 


VklC  A 


Present  weight,  40  carats. 


inci  tor  precious 
and,   keener  and 
.-. -eater  supplies, 
sang  of  the  use  of 
K-nts  to  the  ancient 
whose  existing  ruins 
o  to  7000  years  B.C.1 
re  cutting  and  poiinh- 
k'x,  rind  rock  crystals 
id   advanced   beyond 
cirife.      Then  the 
•M?rh  »ts  treasures.2 
merchant   by 
they  occupied 
work  and   fine 
:>'d  Kaamah, 
-   *srh  chief 


Weight  before  cuttin 
carats ;  weight  after  first 
cutting,  67^  carats  >  pte»- 
ent  weight,  44^  carats. 

\rchxology 


•cic-*   in    the 
jn.      Ewald 


THE   ANCIENT   ADAMAS  9 

precious  stone  was  thy  covering.  Thou  hast  walked  up  and  down 
in  the  midst  of  the  stones  of  fire."  As  tradition  placed  the  garden 
of  Eden  in  the  valley  of  the  Euphrates,  Ezekiel  makes  the  gar- 
den typical  of  the  splendor  of  Babylon  in  his  fervid  outpouring. 

How  the  stones  of  fire  were  brought  into  being  in  the  garden 
of  Eden  or  elsewhere,  Ezekiel  was  not  moved  to  reveal,  and  the 
savants  that  have  sought  to  tell  are  but  groping  seers.  When  a 
sprinkling  of  stones  was  uncovered  by  the  rains  and  floods,  or 
dug  and  washed  from  the  beds  of  gravel,  or  traced  by  r.ude  min- 
ing through  clay  or  conglomerate  layers  or  enclosing  rocks,  there 
was  still  no  widespread  knowledge  of  the  deposits,  and  even 
among  the  most  familiar  with  the  search  there  was  ever  the 
hope  of  finding,  some  day,  some  marvellous  store.  Hence 
sprung  up  the  romances.  Even  in  the  days  when  the  sharp 
tooth  of  history  had  cut  into  legends,  a  story  was  told  of  the 
climbing  of  Zulmat  by  the  great  Alexander,  to  the  rim  of  the 
inaccessible  valley,  where,  beneath  sheer  precipices,  glittered  a 
coverlet  of  the  stones  of  fire.  There  was  no  way  of  winning  the 
diamonds  that  glowed  so  temptingly  except  by  flinging  down 
masses  of  flesh  and  waiting  for  swooping  vultures  to  bear  the 
lumps  up  to  their  perches  on  the  mountain  with  precious  stones 
sticking  in  the  meat.1 

Sindbad  the  sailor  had  this  tale  in  mind  fortunately  in  his 
second  voyage.  It  will  be  remembered  that  he  was  stranded 
by  shipwreck  on  a  desert  island  and  carried  away  by  the  flight 
of  a  gigantic  rukh  to  the  top  of  a  distant  mountain.  From 
this  mountain  he  descended  into  a  neighboring  "  valley,  exceed- 
ing great  and  wide  and  deep  and  bounded  by  vast  mountains 
that  spired  high  in  air."  Walking  along  the  wady,  he  found 
that  "  its  soil  was  of  diamond,  the  stone  wherewith  they  pierce 
minerals  and  precious  stones  and  porcelain  and  the  onyx,  for 
that  it  is  a  dense  stone  and  a  stubborn,  whereon  neither  iron  or 
hardhead  hath  effect,  neither  can  we  cut  off  aught  therefrom, 
nor  break  it  save  by  means  of  lead  stone." 

1  "  Oriental  Accounts  of"  Precious  Minerals,"  Journal  of  Asiatic  Society  of  Ben- 
gal, August,  1832. 


io        THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF    SOUTH    AFRICA 

Luckily  for  the  sailor,  his  descent  was  by  day,  for  "  the  val- 
ley swarmed  with  snakes  and  vipers,  each  as  big  as  a  palm  tree, 
that  would  have  made  but  one  gulp  of  an  elephant ;  and  they 
came  out  by  night,  hiding  during  the  day,  lest  the  rukhs  and 
eagles  pounce  on  them  and  tear  them  to  pieces."  In  view  of 
the  horrid  prospect  of  soon  dropping  through  the  throat  of  one 
of  these  snakes,  Sindbad  began  to  wish  that  he  had  not  flown 
away  from  the  island,  where  he  was,  at  least,  out  of  reach  of  vast 
vipers,  but  he  soon  bethought  himself  of  the  old  story  of  the 
valley  from  which  diamond-studded  meat  was  "plucked  by 
eagles."  So  he  quickly  filled  his  pockets  and  shawl  girdle  and 
turban  with  the  choicest  diamonds.  Then  he  put  a  piece  of  raw 
meat  on  his  breast  and  lay  down  on  his  back.  Soon  a  big 
eagle  swooped  into  the  valley,  clutched  the  meat  in  his  talons, 
and  flew  up  to  a  mountain  above,  "  where,  dropping  the  carcass, 
he  fell  to  rending  it,"  leaving  the  lucky  sailor  to  scramble  off 
with  his  booty.  He  gave  a  parcel  of  the  diamonds  to  the  dis- 
appointed merchant,  who  had  cast  down  the  meat,  but  he  had 
stuffed  his  clothes  so  full  of  the  gems  that  he  went  home,  after 
some  strange  sight-seeing,  with  a  great  store  of  diamonds  and 
money  and  goods.1 

This  amazing  tale  is  less  teeming  with  interest  than  it  was  in 
the  days  when  it  was  first  told,  for,  even  hundreds  of  years 
afterwards,  diamond-lined  valleys  and  monstrous  rukhs  and 
snakes  that  could  gulp  down  elephants  were  not  beyond  cre- 
dence. If  in  valleys  there  might  be  a  diamond  lining,  why 
should  there  not  be  a  massing  of  diamonds  and  rubies  in  the 
dwellings  of  genii  in  caves,  awaiting  the  entry  of  some  lucky 
Aladdin  ?  Oriental  fancy,  teeming  with  visions,  disdained  any 
curbing  within  the  petty  confines  of  crawling  experience,  and  was 
prolific  in  marvels  far  more  pleasing  to  the  masses  that  egged 
on  the  story-tellers  with  craving  credulity.  Who  then  could 
explode  these  bubbles  with  any  sharp  prick  of  positive  contra- 
diction ?  Even  if  in  all  known  fields  the  precious  stones  were 
gathered  by  toilsome  searches  only  rarely  rewarded,  who  had  the 
1  "Arabian  Nights,"  Lady  Burton's  edition,  Vol.  Ill,  pp.  476-482. 


THE   ANCIENT  ADAM  AS  u 

range  of  knowledge  to  deny  the  possible  existence  of  caverns 
filled  with  rubies  or  mountain  summits  studded  with  diamonds  ? 

Seeing  that  to  this  day  so  little  can  be  asserted  positively  of 
the  forming  of  the  precious  stones  scattered  in  the  earth's  crust, 
it  is  not  surprising  that  the  origin  of  the  stones  of  fire  has  been, 
from  the  first,  a  baffling  puzzle  and  a  fountain-head  of  conflict- 
ing surmises.  Some  wondering  people  viewed  them  as  splin- 
ters dropping  from  the  stars,  and  some,  as  the  creations  or 
transformations  of  genii.  Some  Hindoo  miners  still  believe 
that  diamonds  grow  like  onions,  though  much  less  quickly,  and 
that  their  age  is  marked  by  the  difference  in  their  size  and 
quality.  Others  suppose  the  common  rock  crystals  to  be 
immature  diamonds,  and  the  distinction  is  marked  by  calling 
the  rock  crystal  kacha  (unripe),  while  the  diamond  is  pakka 
(ripe).' 

For  the  ripening  of  the  crystals  and  the  quickening  of  their 
seeming  inward  fire,  the  lightning  bolts,  that  sometimes  rived 
the  ground,  were  thought  to  be  potent.  Others  again,  observ- 
ing the  liquid  purity  and  likeness  which  is  marked  to  this  day 
in  the  term  "  diamonds  of  the  purest  water,"  attributed  the 
forming  of  the  crystals  to  the  supernormal  trickle  and  hardening 
of  dewdrops.  It  is  of  this  fancy  that  Dryden  makes  poetic  use 
in  his  likening  of  the  tears  of  Almahide  :  — 

"  What  precious  drops  are  those, 

Which  silently  each  other's  track  pursue, 

Bright  as  young  diamonds  in  their  infant  dew  ?  "  2 

Bizarre  speculation  was  stretched  even  to  the  point  of  attrib- 
uting to  these  strange  crystals  animal  instincts  and  reproductive 
powers.  Thus  Barreto  is  quoted  in  the  dictionary  of  Antonio 
de  Moraes  Silva  as  saying  :  — 

"  Que  os  diamantes  se  unem,  amam  e  procream."  3 

1  "Oriental  Accounts  of  Precious  Minerals."      Translation  by  Rajah  Kalikis- 
ken,  Asiatic  Society  of  Bengal. 

2  "The  Conquest  of  Granada,"  Second  Part,  Act  III,  Scene  I,  Dryden. 

3  "Commonplace  Book,"  Second  Series,  p.  668,  Southey. 


12        THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

The  tradition  of  the  generative  power  of  this  marvellous 
crystal  originates  with  the  Hindoos,  and  to  this  day  the 
natives  of  Pharrah  will  affirm  that  the  diamond  beds  yield 
fresh  supplies  of  well-grown  stones  at  intervals  of  from  fifteen 
to  twenty  years. 

It  is  seemingly  hopeless  to  attempt  to  fix  with  any  certainty 
the  time  when  the  diamond  was  first  singled  out  from  the  peb- 
bles in  which  it  lay,  and  was  prized  by  any  one,  or  even  when  it 
entered  the  list  of  gems  known  to  the  chief  nations  of  Asia. 
Traditions  coming  down  through  the  mists  of  legendary  ages  are 
conflicting  and  uncertain  reliances  at  best.  The  ancient  writers 
add  to  this  perplexity  by  loose  or  erroneous  descriptions  when 
the  advance  of  the  science  had  not  marked  precise  distinctions 
of  structure  and  composition.  Thus  the  Carbunculus  of  Pliny 
was  probably  stretched  to  cover  the  spinel  or  Balas  ruby,  the 
garnet  and  other  red  stones,  besides  embracing  the  Anthrax  of 
Theophrastus  or  our  modern  ruby.  Many  ancient  writers  con- 
founded also  under  the  general  term  Smaragdus  various  dis- 
tinct minerals  of  green  color,  not  only  the  true  emerald,  but 
green  jasper,  malachite,  chryscolla,  and  fluor  spar.1  Among  the 
common  people,  pretending  to  no  mineralogical  knowledge, 
there  was  less  thought  of  distinction,  and,  in  days  approaching 
our  own,  Tavernier  observes  in  his  travels,  A.D.  1669,  after 
describing  the  true  ruby  of  Pegu,  in  Ceylon,  "  the  fatherland 
of  rubies,"  that  "all  other  stones  in  this  country  are  called  by 
the  name  Ruby,  and  are  only  distinguished  by  color,  thus,  in 
the  language  of  Pegu,  the  sapphire  is  a  Blue  Ruby,"  etc.2  This 
confusion  is  not  surprising,  and  a  much  more  discreditable  one 
occurred  within  the  last  thirty  years  in  the  sensational  touting 
of  the  discovery  of  rubies  in  the  garnets  of  the  Macdonnell 
Ranges  in  South  Australia.  It  seems  highly  probable  that  the 
stone  of  exquisite  blue,  now  particularly  distinguished  as  the 
typical  sapphire,  was  the  ancient  Hyacinthus ;  and  the  Sap- 
phirus  of  the  ancients  certainly  included  the  lapis  lazuli  and 

1  "Precious  Stones  and  Gems,"  Streeter,  London,  1892. 

2  "  Voyages  en  Turquie,  en  Perse  et  aux  Indes,"    Paris,  1676. 


THE    ANCIENT  ADAM  AS  13 

covered  the  range  of  corundums  of  every  tint  except  red.  Thus 
green  sapphires  are  noted,  although  very  rarely,  and  yellow  and 
gray,  as  well  as  pure  white  or  colorless,  and  this  stone  is  pre- 
sumed by  Streeter  and  other  investigators  to  have  been  the 
"  adamas  "  first  known  to  the  Greeks.1 

There  can  be  no  question  that  sapphires  or  corundums  of 
varied  hue  were  much  more  common  than  diamonds  in  the  hands 
of  the  merchants  of  the  East  or  any  other  ancient  collectors  before 
the  Christian  era.  The  sapphire  was,  indeed,  one  of  the  most 
widely  known  of  all  gems,  and  how  highly  it  was  valued  may  be 
surmised  from  the  dignity  given  to  it  by  the  sacred  writers.  The 
prophet  Ezekiel  likens  to  a  "  Sapphire  stone  "  the  appearance  of 
the  throne  in  the  firmament  above  the  cherubim.  Job  makes 
it  the  representative  of  all  gems  in  his  splendid  description  of  the 
daring  of  miners.2 

Like  the  sapphire,  the  diamond  is  repeatedly  referred  to  by 
the  Hebrew  writers.  It  formed  one  of  the  typical  stones  in  the 
high  priest's  breastplate,  and  Ezekiel  puts  it  in  the  first  rank  of 
the  stones  of  fire.  Jeremiah  speaks  of  the  sin  of  Judah  as  written 
with  the  point  of  a  diamond,  "  puncto  adamantinis"  of  the  Latin 
Bible,  but  Streeter  holds  that  this  pen  point  was  probably  a 
corundum  and  not  the  true  diamond.3 

This  is  a  stretch  of  assumption  largely  based  upon  the  lack 
of  any  precise  description  applying  to  the  diamond  until  close  to 
the  beginning  of  the  first  century  of  our  reckoning.  Adamas, 
the  indomitable,  the  adamant  of  the  ancients,  was  the  name  given 
to  the  diamond  because  of  its  distinguishing  hardness.  Pliny 
was  greatly  impressed  by  what  he  heard  of  this  characteristic, 
but  obviously  knew  little  or  nothing  of  the  stone  by  personal 
handling  or  test.  For  he  wrote  down  soberly :  "  The  most 
valuable  thing  on  earth  is  the  Diamond,  known  only  to  kings, 
and  to  them  imperfectly.  It  is  only  engendered  in  the  finest 
gold.  Six  different  kinds  are  known,  among  these  the  Indian 

1  "  Traite   de   Mineralogie,   avec   application   aux    Arts,"    Brongniart,    Paris, 
1807. 

2  Job  xxviii.   I— 1 1.  8  "  Precious  Stones  and  Gems,"  Streeter. 


i4        THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

and  Arabian  of  such  indomitable,  unspeakable  hardness,  that 
when  laid  on  the  anvil  it  gives  the  blow  back  in  such  force  as  to 
shiver  the  hammer  and  anvil  to  pieces.1 

Unfortunately  for  the  aim  of  identifying  the  diamond  with 
the  references  to  the  ancient  adamas,  the  term  was  commonly  and 
loosely  applied  to  any  substance  of  peculiar  hardness.  So  moun- 
tains of  iron-stone,  like  unto  that  upon  which  the  ship  of  Sindbad 
was  dashed,  were  called  adamant,  and  so  too  were  the  arms  and 
armor  of  gods  and  heroes.  Addison  only  transmits  a  tradition 
in  the  fine  lines  of  his  poem  — 

"  And  mighty  Mars,  for  war  renowned, 
In  adamantine  armor  frowned." 

In  Homer,  as  Streeter  notes,  adamas  occurs  only  as  a  per- 
sonal name,  and  in  Hesiod,  Pindar,  and  other  early  Greek  poets 
it  is  used  to  signify  any  hard  weapon  or  metal  like  steel  or  an 
alloy  of  the  harder  metals.3  No  distinct  identification  of  the 
diamond  with  adamas  appears,  according  to  Streeter's  view,  until 
the  first  century  A.D.,  in  the  writings  of  the  Latin  poet  and  astron- 
omer Manilius,  and  his  contemporary  Pliny  (A.D.  62-114).  In 
the  fourth  book  of  Manilius's  poem  "  Astronomicum,"  occurs 
this  line,  "  Sic  Adamas,  punctum  lapidis,  pretiosior  auro,"  which, 
Streeter  says,  "  is  supposed  to  be  the  earliest  indubitable  reference 
to  the  true  diamond."  It  is  difficult  to  see  how  this  "  stone's 
point,  more  precious  than  gold,"  is  any  more  distinct  and  indubi- 
table in  its  reference  to  the  diamond  than  the  diamond  pen  point 
of  Jeremiah  hundreds  of  years  before.  But  Pliny,  with  all  his 
erroneous  amplifications,  unquestionably  describes  the  true  Indian 
diamond  as  "  colorless,  transparent,  with  polished  facets  and  six 
angles  ending  either  in  a  pyramid  with  a  sharp  point  or  with  two 
points  like  whipping  tops  joined  at  the  base."  4 

1  "Historia  Naturalis,"  XXXVII,   15. 

2  Poem  addressed  to  Sir  Godfrey  Kneller,  referring  to  William  III.  of  England. 

3  "  a8a/Aas  yevos  otSv^ov,"  ^Eschylus.      See  Stanley's  Commentary  on  ^Eschy- 
lus,  "  Prometheus  Vinctus." 

4  Plinii  Secundi  (Caii),  "  Naturalis  Historia,"  XXXVII,  15. 


In  view  of  the  han 
scratch  every  other  pre* 
fore  contended  that  th 
Greek  writers  as  adat 
doubted  that,  even  at  a 
pale  yellow  topaz  or  a  , 
mond  in  the  hands 
selling.     Whatever 
or  the  application  ot 
reason  in  this  f 
monds  were  found  in 
Christian,  era.       As  far 
were  particularly  prizec 
and  were  strictly  exacted  in 
diamond-bed  washers.     But  t 
were  less  jealously  guarded, 
have  found  their  way  ir 
with  the  other  peoples  < 
It  seems  most  probable 
their  first  knowledge  01 
the  Egyptians  chiefly,  f 
of  Egyptian  derivation, 
for  the  assumption  that 
version  of  the  Hebi. 
that  allusions   to  the 
wholly  unreliable  or 
The  main  sur 
onds  with   th 
the  appa 
the  site  < 
are  brought 
settings    have  h 

1746.      "  Elem.    de 
Wor  or. 

1         »  "  Em 


i  or  a 
f  gem 


Present  weight,  51  carats. 


.  >  K1CA 

hardness,  that 
such  torve  as  to 


j   ;hf  vbamond  wuh 
i  was  c  Mnrnonly  and 

!i;ird:i<--.        So  moun- 
h  the  <ivi.i  of  Sindbad 


oo  vvcr  :  :it<*  arms 
trans;    ^~s  a  trad 


•v  as  a  per- 

-'.'k  poets 

r  an 


tHi 


in 

irs 


,  And  six 
with  two 


THE   ANCIENT   ADAMAS  15 

In  view  of  the  hardness  of  the  sapphire,  so  great  that  it  will 
scratch  every  other  precious  stone  except  the  diamond,  it  is  there- 
fore contended  that  this  was  the  stone  known  to  the  earliest 
Greek  writers  as  adamas.1  This  may  be  so,  and  it  cannot  be 
doubted  that,  even  at  a  much  later  day,  a  white  corundum  or  a 
pale  yellow  topaz  or  a  good  rock  crystal  often  passed  for  a  dia- 
mond in  the  hands  of  collectors  or  in  the  sharp  practice  of  gem 
selling.  Whatever  may  have  been  the  blundering  of  the  Greeks 
or  the  application  of  adamas,  there  is,  nevertheless,  no  sufficient 
reason  in  this  for  questioning  the  probability  that  genuine  dia- 
monds were  found  in  the  gravels  of  India  many  centuries  before  the 
Christian  era.  As  far  back  as  tradition  goes  the  largest  stones 
were  particularly  prized  by  the  native  princes, 
and  were  strictly  exacted  in  tribute  from  the 
diamond-bed  washers.  But  the  smaller  stones 
were  less  jealously  guarded,  and  may  readily 
have  found  their  way  into  the  hands  of  traders 
with  the  other  peoples  of  Asia  or  with  Egypt. 
It  seems  most  probable  that  the  Jews  derived 
their  first  knowledge  of  precious  stones  from  The  Empress  Eugenie" 
the  Egyptians  chiefly,  for  the  Hebrew  names  of  the  stones  are 
of  Egyptian  derivation.2  Thus  there  is  no  approach  to  certainty 
for  the  assumption  that  the  stones  called  diamonds  in  the  English 
version  of  the  Hebrew  Scriptures  were  not  rightly  named,  or 
that  allusions  to  the  diamond  in  other  ancient  writings  were 
wholly  unreliable  or  mistaken. 

The  main  support  for  the  questioning  of  the  mingling  of 
diamonds  with  the  other  gems  noted  by  the  ancient  writers  is 
the  apparent  failure  to  uncover  diamonds  in  the  excavations  on 
the  site  of  ancient  temples  and  cities  where  other  precious  stones 
are  brought  to  light.  Thus  emeralds  and  other  gems  in  various 
settings  have  been  exhumed  from  the  volcanic  overflow  that 

1  "History  of  Stones,"  Theophrastus.      Edited   by  Sir  John   Hill,   London, 
1746.      "  Elem.   de   Min.,"   Lessing,   II,   61.      "The  Great  Diamonds  of  the 
World,"  Streeter. 

2  "  Encyclopedia  of  Religious  Knowledge,"  Schaff-Herzog. 


16        THE    DIAiMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH   AFRICA 

buried  Herculaneum  and  Pompeii,  from  the  ruins  of  old  Rome, 
and  the  tombs  of  Egypt.1  In  the  course  of  explorations  on  the 
site  of  Curium  and  other  ancient  towns  in  Cyprus,  scarabs 
and  scaraboids  of  agate,  onyx,  jasper,  and  variously  tinted  car- 
nelians  were  found,  as  well  as  gold  ornaments,  relics  traced  to  the 
days  of  Eteandros,  king  of  Paphos  in  the  seventh  century  B.C.  ; 
but  no  diamonds  were  unearthed  in  this  collection.2  Nor  is 

there  record,  as  yet,  of  the  discovery  of 
diamonds  in  the  explorations  in  Baby- 
lonia.3 

But  this  is,  at  most,  evidence  pointing 
to  what  is  undoubted,  —  the  comparative 
rarity  of  the  diamond  among  the  gems 
that  served  as  amulets  or  ornaments  for 
the  people  of  western  Asia,  northern 

The  Nassak.  .  r  .  IT--  •  i 

Africa,  or  southern  Europe  prior  to  the 

Christian  era  and  for  centuries  afterward.  Pliny  expressly  asserts 
this  rarity  in  his  allusion  to  the  diamond  ;  but  the  fact  that  the 
gem  was  scarce,  outside  of  India,  is  entirely  compatible  with  its 
occasional  inclusion  in  the  collections  of  sovereigns,  which  the 
same  writer  remarks,  and  the  high  value  set  upon  it  would 
naturally  limit  its  use  as  an  ornament. 

It  is  impossible  to  mark  with  any  precision  in  what  district 
of  India  a  search  for  diamonds  first  began.  Rajah  Sourindo 
Mohun  Tagore,  in  his  account  of  the  precious  stones  of  India, 
gives  the  names  of  eight  localities  in  which  diamonds  have  been 
found  according  to  tradition  or  more  certain  report.  These  are 
Harma  (Himalayas),  Matanga  (Kistna),  and  Godaveri  (or  Gol- 
conda),  Saurashtra  (Surat),  Paunda  (probably  including  the  Chutia 
Nagpur  Province),  Kalinga  (the  tract  between  Orissa  and  the 
Godaveri),  Kosala  (the  modern  Ajodhya  or  Berar),  Vera  Ganga 

1  Clarke's  "  Travels,"  Vol.  VIII,  p.  150. 

2  Story  of  the  Nations,  "  Phoenicia,"  George  Rawlinson. 

3  "  Nineveh   and    Babylon,"   pp.   160-161,  602    et  seq.,  Layard  ;   "  Arch- 
aeology of  the  Past  Century,"  Professor  W.  M.  F.  Petrie. 


^.OUTH    AFRICA 


Present  weight,  82!  carats. 


.  from  the  ruins  ot  u)d  Rome, 
•he  course  of  explorations  on  the 
-..  vnt    towns    in    Cyprus,    -if 
>.,   jasper,  and  various;     tin  red  car- 
nold  ornaments,  :-ehcs  traced  to  the 
''iphos  in  t'-u-  ^evenrh   century  B.C.; 
.TiMrrhed   in    this    collection.*      Nor    is 
•;/;-•   record.  ;<>     •.•",  'it  the  disrown  of 
.t?ii'>nds   in        •   explorations   nt    K 


But  thi' 
fo  xvlvrii  ;s  li 
rnriiy  ot  t.!. 
thar  vf.TVv.-ii 
the  people 
Africa,  or  , 


Most,  evidence  pointing 

-  the  comparative 

j  among  the  gems 

ornaments  for 

Asu,    northern 

prior  to  the 

:  x-^CMsi',  asserts 

?a-  r  that  the 

.  *'  («»»e  Vrith  its 

v    which  the 

it   would 


u   in,  irk  -,s  'in   .in 
•r   cii'.ir.i-".pi'..s    fir>f 
•  .  ;  .uTnuin  ot  tjv. 
''\!    localities  in  • 
..••;<.'.'!  or  more  <. 
'•-!  i-.>:ufM.  :  Ki<tr.  - 


Hat  district 

j    Sounndo 

s  ot    India, 

r.,i\'«;  been 

I  hese  are 

:i    (or  Gol- 

the  Chutia 

sa  and  the 

era   (.janga 


ADA 


(the  Wemganga 
and  Indus  rive: 

According  r  howir 

wide  ranging  r\ 
comprehens; 
surface  deposits,  and  -. 
logic    antiqu 
borrows  its  i 
It  seem^  pre? 


n  the  Sarhund 


ored  over  a 

• 

indyha- 

Hills  of  old  £ 
t   the   surface  wast 
from   th  the  diamond    in    i 

glomer  gravels    there   arc 

quently    no    d  z   of    a    conglomei 

rounded   pv  It   is  likely  that 

firs'.  he  surface  wash  and  that  the 

mon 

In  some  of  the  diamond-bearing  districts  of  India  to-day 
the  native  villagers  are  searching  for  diamonds  exactly  as  their 
fathers  did  in  days  of  remotest  tradition.  After  a  heavy  rain 
that  washes  away  loose  soil,  a 
sprinkling  of  diamonds  may  be 
found  in  expos  .stone  brec- 

cia,    and     sh;i.  Him. 

scrape  the  face  of  the  ground  for 
the  precious  cr 

Along  the  banks  of  the  Kistna 
and  Godaveri  rivers  the  Golconda 

of  tradition  outstretched,  and  this     

diamond-studded     ground     came 
later  in;-  .nds  of  the  Nizam         \\ 

of  1  id,  and  was  included 

in  the  bounds  of  the  Madras  Preside^ 

bed  of  the  Koh-i-nur  and 
and  «f  the  jewels  most  renow 

Here,  of  a  certainty,  was  the  richest  d 

1  "Mani  Mala,"  Calcutta,  1879. 

1  "  Manual  of  Geological  Survey  of  India,"  P 


ight  before  cutting,  787!  carats; 
present  weight,  279^  carats. 


THE   ANCIENT   ADAMAS  17 

(the  Wemganga),  and  Saubira  (the  stretch  between  the  Sarhund 
and  Indus  rivers).1 

According  to  this  showing  the  diamond  is  scattered  over  a 
wide  ranging  region,  but  it  occurs  everywhere  in  one  of  two 
comprehensive  formations,  —  alluvial  or  otherwise  disintegrated 
surface  deposits,  and  conglomerate  rocks  of  far  receding  geo- 
logic antiquity,  belonging  to  the  Vindyhan  formation,  which 
borrows  its  name  from  the  Vindyhan  Hills  of  old  geographers.2 
It  seems  reasonable  to  presume  that  the  surface  wash  comes 
from  the  disintegration  of  the  seat  of  the  diamond  in  con- 
glomerate beds,  —  for  even  in  alluvial  gravels  there  are  fre- 
quently no  diamonds  found  outside  of  a  conglomerate  of 
rounded  pebbles  and  sandstone  breccia.  It  is  likely  that  the 
first  diamonds  were  taken  from  the  surface  wash  and  that  the 
more  solid  breccia  was  opened  later. 

In  some  of  the  diamond-bearing  districts  of  India  to-day 
the  native  villagers  are  searching  for  diamonds  exactly  as  their 
fathers  did  in  days  of  remotest  tradition.  After  a  heavy  rain 
that  washes  away  loose  soil,  a 
sprinkling  of  diamonds  may  be 
found  in  exposed  sandstone  brec- 
cia, and  sharp-eyed  Hindoos 
scrape  the  face  of  the  ground  for 
the  precious  crystals. 

Along  the  banks  of  the  Kistna 
and  Godaveri  rivers  the  Golconda 
of  tradition  outstretched,  and  this 
diamond-studded  ground  came 
later  into  the  hands  of  the  Nizam 
of  Hyderabad,  and  was  included  The  Great  Mogul, 

in  the  bounds  of  the  Madras  Presidency.  Here,  it  is  claimed, 
was  the  bed  of  the  Koh-i-nur  and  Regent  and  Great  Mogul, 
and  others  of  the  jewels  most  renowned  in  history  and  romance. 
Here,  of  a  certainty,  was  the  richest  diamond  field  in  India,  in 

1  "Mani  Mala,"  Calcutta,  1879. 

2  "Manual  of  Geological  Survey  of  India,"  Professor  V.  Ball,  Vol.  III. 


i8        THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

the  days  of  Tavernier's  travels  (1669  A.D.).  Here  was  the 
famous  mine,  "  Gani-Coulour,"  that  he  saw,  where  sixty  thou- 
sand natives  were  then  at  work,  and  "  Gani-Parteal,"  and 
twenty  more  of  lesser  note.1  Gani-Coulour  has  probably  been 
identified  with  the  modern  Kolur  on  the  Kistna,  Gani  being 
simply  a  slight  change  of  the  Persian  "  Kan-i "  or  "mine  of," 
so  that  Gani-Coulour  is  the  mine  of  Kolur  as  Gani-Parteal  is 
the  mine  of  Parteal.2  The  surface  ground  of  this  district  along 
the  rivers  is  a  black  "  cotton  soil  "  washed  down  by  floods,  and 
underlying  this  at  an  average  depth  of  twenty  feet  is  a  layer  of 
broken  sandstone,  quartz,  jasper,  flint,  and  granite,  interspersed 
with  masses  of  calcareous  conglomerate,  forming  the  stratum  in 
which  the  diamonds  were  embedded.  When  the  black  soil  had 
been  dug  up  laboriously  and  carried  away,  the  diamond-bearing 
layer  was  exposed,  and  was  removed,  piecemeal,  to  level  stretches 
of  ground  or  prepared  floors,  where  it  was  scraped  and  picked 
over  by  hand  to  find  the  diamonds. 

The  whole  of  this  rich  mining  district  and  a  tract  stretching 
for  many  miles  away  was  loosely  called  Golconda,  or  the  King- 
dom of  Golconda,  by  foreign  traders  and  travellers,  because  the 
town  of  Golconda  was  its  capital  and  the  trading  centre  where 
the  diamonds  from  the  mines  were  chiefly  bought  and  sold. 
The  only  mark  of  this  old  mart  to-day  is  a  deserted  fort  near 
Hyderabad,  but  its  fame  will  endure  until  traditionary  Golconda 
ceases  to  be  a  standard  of  riches. 

Next  in  importance  and  prestige  to  the  mines  of  Golconda 
was  the  diamond  field  of  Sumbulpur,  in  the  Central  Provinces, 
between  the  rivers  Mahanadi  and  Brahmini.  The  diamonds  of 
this  district  were  remarkable  for  their  purity  and  beauty,  though 
no  very  large  crystals  have  been  traced  to  this  region,  and  the 
few  which  the  washings  still  yield  rank  with  the  finest  of  the 
Indian  stones.  Here  the  precious  stones  were  found  chiefly 
along  the  course  of  the  Mahanadi,  in  a  stratum  of  tough  clay 
and  pebbles  stained  reddish  by  iron  oxide.  At  the  opening  of 

1  "  Voyages  en  Turquie,  en  Perse  et  aux  Indes,"  Tavernier,  Paris,  1676. 

2  "  Manual  of  Geological  Survey  of  India,"  Vol.  III. 


THE   ANCIENT   ADAMAS  19 

the  dry  season,  thousands  of  villagers,  men,  women,  and  chil- 
dren, began  to  search  every  cleft  and  cranny  in  the  river  beds 
for  diamonds.  With  ankovas,  or  light  picks,  the  men  broke 
and  scraped  out  the  diamond-bearing  bed  and  piled  the  broken 
ground  on  the  river  bank.  Then  the  women  scooped  up 
ground  from  the  heaps  with  their  daers.  These  were  shovel- 
shaped  boards,  about  five  feet  long,  with  ridged  sides  and  hol- 
lowed in  the  centre.  Resting  one  end  of  the  daer  on  the 
ground  and  tilting  the  other  slightly,  they  washed  away  the  clay 
and  sand  and  picked  off  the  rock  splinters  and  larger  pebbles. 
After  this  rude  sorting  they  spread  out  the  finer  gravel  on  a 
smaller  board,  the  kootla,  and  scraped  it  over  very  carefully  to 
separate  the  diamond  crystals  and  grains  of  gold.  When  there 
was  a  level  stretch  along  a  bank,  the  native  workers  would  some- 
times make  an  enclosure  on  this  flat,  with  a  low  wall  pierced  at 
several  points  by  small  waterways.  Then  they  would  dump 
the  diamond-bearing  ground  into  this  shallow  basin  and  wash 
away  the  clay  and  dirt  with  running  water.  After  two  or  three 
washings  they  would  pick  out  the  larger  stones  from  the  cleaned 
gravel,  and  dry  the  remainder,  to  be  picked  over  on  their  kootlas 
or  on  any  smooth,  hard  flooring. 

Perhaps  the  most  laborious  diamond  digging  in  India  has 
been  in  the  pits  of  Panna  and  neighboring  villages  in  the  Prov- 
ince of  Bundelkhund.  Here  the  diamond-bearing  conglomerate 
was  buried  under  a  cover  of  heavy  ground,  ranging  in  places 
over  thirty  feet  in  thickness.  To  reach  the  diamond  strata  large 
pits  were  dug,  with  inclines  leading  to  the  bottom  in  or  below  the 
conglomerate.  There  was  no  drainage,  and  the  diamond  diggers 
were  forced  to  work  in  the  rainy  season  knee-deep  in  water, 
breaking  the  conglomerate,  and  filling  baskets  which  were  hauled 
by  hand  to  the  top  of  the  pits.  In  this  primitive  fashion  the 
diamond  beds  of  India  were  opened,  and  diamonds  are  to-day 
won  by  these  simple  methods  or  others  essentially  similar.1 

1  "A  Treatise  on  Diamonds  and  Precious  Stones,"  John  Mawe,  London, 
1813.  "  A  Treatise  on  Gems,"  Feuchtwanger,  New  York,  1867.  "Precious 
Stones  and  Gems,"  Streeter,  London,  1892. 


20        THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

Color  and  size  were  the  chief  distinction  in  diamonds,  as  in 
the  other  precious  stones,  in  the  early  days  before  the  advance 
of  the  art  of  diamond  cutting  which  has  added  so  greatly  to  the 
brilliancy  and  beauty  of  this  gem.  Centuries  ran  by  before 
the  ancient  lapidaries  attempted  more  than  the  polishing  of  the 
surfaces  of  the  natural  facets  of  the  crystal,  though  the  compara- 
tive ease  with  which  this  hardest  of  stones  may  be  split  by  fol- 
lowing the  natural  cleavage  lines  may  have  been  observed.  Size 
was  rated  so  highly  by  the  Hindoos  in  valuing  a  gem  that  the 
conception  of  increasing  the  worth  of  a  jewel  by  cutting  away 
the  greater  part  of  it  would  not  have  been  tolerated  even  if  it 
had  been  feasible.  When  cutting  to  a  limited  extent  began  to 
be  practised  in  India,  it  was  generally  unsymmetrical  and  unsci- 
entific, as  the  oldest  known  diamonds  bear  witness,  and  there 
was  comparatively  little  advance  for  many  centuries,  as  every 
celebrated  gem  of  Indian  workmanship  plainly  shows.1  But 
even  with  imperfect  cutting  and  crude  polishing  the  inherent 
beauties  of  the  ancient  stones  were  more  or  less  fully  disclosed. 

In  the  mines  of  Panna  there  were  four  noted  divisions  in 
grading.  Clear  and  brilliant  stones  were  in  the  class  Motichul, 
Mansk  was  the  class  name  applied  to  diamonds  of  greenish  tint, 
Panna  to  light  yellow,  and  Bunsput  to  sepia  colored  stones.2 
In  India  at  large  there  was  a  comprehensive  divisional  grading 
corresponding  to  the  main  caste  distinctions,  —  the  "twice-born," 
priests,  warriors,  and  merchants,  and  the  "  once-born,"  tillers  of 
the  land.3  The  Brahmans  were  the  diamonds  of  highest  range, 
clear  and  colorless  crystals  ;  the  Kshatriyas,  clear  crystals,  amber 
tinted  or  of  the  color  of  honey  ;  Vaisyas,  the  cream  colored  ;  and 
the  servile  Sudras,  the  grayish  white  stones.  Grades  in  rank 
were  more  minutely  marked  in  the  rubies  of  the  famous  Badak- 
shan  mines  in  Persia,  where  the  common  people  believed  that 
the  precious  stones  were  deposited  in  the  "  rag-i-lal  "  or  parent 
vein  in  successive  layers.  The  outside  layer  contained  the  small 

1  "  A  Treatise  on  Diamonds  and  Pearls,"  David  Jeffries,  London,  1751. 

2  "  Precious  Stones  and  Gems,"  Streeter. 

3  "Annals  of  India,"  J.  Talboys  Wheeler,  Calcutta,  1881. 


THE    ANCIENT   ADAMAS  21 

and  imperfect  stones  styled  piadehs,  foot  soldiers ;  the  next,  a 
better  class  of  stones  called  sawars,  horse  soldiers;  and  so  on 
through  layers  of  amirs,  bakshis,  and  vazirs  until  a  single  stone 
was  reached,  transcending  all  in  size  and  beauty,  which  the  min- 
ers polished  dutifully,  and  took  in  tribute  to  their  sovereign.1 

With  the  expansion  of  Greek  commerce  and  the  entry  of 
Greek  mercenaries  into  the  employ  of  satraps  in  Asia  Minor 
(about  500  B.C.),  the  riches  of  the  Orient  were  made  known,  and 
precious  stones  began  to  pass  into  Europe.  Herodotus,  484  B.C., 
was  first  of  the  early  Greek  writers  2  to  mark  particularly  the  dis- 
plays of  precious  stones  in  palaces  and  temples — the  signet  rings 
of  Darius,  the  magnificent  emerald  in  the  ring  of  Polycrates,  and 
the  marvellous  show  of  the  emerald  column  in  the  temple  of 
Hercules  in  Tyre,  gleaming  like  a  pillar  of  green  fire  at  night. 
This  fiery  column  has  a  certain  likeness  to  the  traditional  stone 
as  big  as  an  ostrich  egg,  to  which  homage  was  paid  as  the  "  God- 
dess of  Emeralds"  by  the  people  of  the  Manca  Valley  in  Peru. 
Sceptics  would  clip  the  marvel  of  both  by  substitution  of  beryl, 
or  aquamarine,  or  colored  glass  ;  but  this  trimming  of  legend 
does  not  question  the  extraction  of  true  emeralds  from  mines  in 
Upper  Egypt,  or  the  superb  yield  of  the  deposits  in  Peru  and 
New  Grenada.8 

The  conquests  of  Alexander  the  Great  (334-323  B.C.)  made 
the  Greeks  familiar  with  the  precious  stones  of  India  as  well  as 
of  Western  and  Central  Asia.  His  successors  revelled  in  pro- 
fuse displays  of  jewelled  rings  and  bracelets,  and  wine  cups  and 
candelabra,  in  luxurious  banquets.  Pliny  tells  a  glowing  tale  of 
a  statue  of  Arsinoe,  wife  of  Ptolemy  Philadelphus  (283  B.C.), 
four  cubits  in  height,  made  of  topazon.4  The  true  topaz  was 
undoubtedly  known  to  the  ancient  Egyptians,  and  is  still  obtained 
at  Risk  Allah  near  the  old  emerald  mines  of  Jebel  Zabara ;  but 
the  Oriental  topaz  is  presumed  to  have  been  the  yellow  sapphire  ; 

1  "Oriental  Accounts  of  Precious  Minerals,"  Journal  of  Asiatic  Society  of 
Bengal,  August,  1832.  '2  Rawlinson's  "Herodotus." 

3  Brun's  "  Travels."  Rawlinson's  "  Herodotus,"  II.  44.  Prescott's  "  Con- 
quest of  Mexico."  4  "Historia  Naturalis,"  XXXVII,  32. 


22        THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

and  the  Greek  topazios,  the  yellowish  green  chrysolite  or  the 
peridot,  of  deeper  green  tint.  The  word  is  derived  from  Torra£a, 
"  to  seek,"  because  the  traditional  source  was  an  island  in  the 
Red  Sea,  often  difficult  to  reach  through  its  envelope  of  fog.1 
The  loose  use  of  the  term  by  Pliny  and  other  old  writers  makes 
it  impracticable  to  mark  with  any  certainty  from  what  greenish 
hued  stone  Arsinoe's  statue  was  cut.  Still,  in  spite  of  current 
exaggeration  and  confusion  of  distinctions,  there  can  be  no  doubt 
of  the  rising  production  and  circulation  of  the  precious  stones. 

With  the  spread  of  the  Roman  Empire  prodigality  in  dis- 
plays ran  riot.  After  Pompey's  victory  over  Mithradates, 
(B.C.  66)  precious  stones  and  pearls  poured  into  Rome  and  the 
demand  of  vanity  rose  to  a  passion.2  Pliny  writes  :  "  We  drink 
out  of  a  mass  of  gems  crusting  our  wine  bowls,  and  our  drinking 
cups  are  emeralds."  To  heighten  the  wonder  he  tells  in  his  gos- 
siping way  how  emeralds  were  set  as  the  eyes  of  a  lion  sculptured 
in  marble  on  the  tomb  of  King  Hermias  in  the  island  of  Cyprus. 
So  great  was  the  size  and  so  piercing  the  light  of  these  emerald 
eyes  that  the  tunny  fish  in  the  surrounding  sea  were  frightened 
away  until  the  fishermen  of  Cyprus  put  common  stones  in  place  of 
the  dazzling  gems.  Later  scepticism  would  make  these  emerald 
eyes  of  malachite,  for  copper  ores  were  of  common  occurrence  in 
Cyprus3  and  the  glory  of  the  emerald  was  scattered  by  loose  usage 
over  green  fluor  spar,  jasper,  aquamarine,  malachite,  and  perhaps 
even  green  glass.  There  is  also  a  shaking  of  the  marvel  of  the  cups, 
holding  a  pint,  that  were  made  out  of  solid  carbuncles ;  for  these 
are  supposed  to  be  cuttings  from  the  common  garnets  of  the  Bar- 
bary  coast,  flowing  out  from  Carthage  in  such  profusion  that  the 
carbuncle  was  called  "the  Carthaginian  stone."4 

Beryl  was   largely  used   in   the  ornamentation  of  cups  and 

1  Diodorus  Siculus,  Lib.  Ill,  c.  38.  Jameson's  "  Mineralogy,"  p.  48. 
Kidd's  "  Mineralogy,"  I,  izi.  2  "  Historia  Naturalis,"  XXXVII,  6-7. 

3  Cleaveland's     "Mineralogy,"    p.     565.       Theophrastus,    "  De     Lapid.," 
c.   49. 

4  "The  Story  of  Carthage,"  p.   121,  Alfred  J.  Church,  M.A.       "Story  of 
the  Nations." 


THE   ANCIENT   ADAMAS  23 

for  cameos ; 1  and  carnelian  was  particularly  prized  as  a  base  for 
the  engraving  of  seals  or  cameos,  sometimes  elaborately  pictorial. 
The  great  scarab  in  the  Prussian  cabinet,  representing  the  five 
heroes  of  Thebes,  is  a  recognized  masterpiece  of  old  Etruscan 
art,  and  a  deep-cut  carnelian  once  belonging  to  Michael  Angelo 
portrays  the  birthday  festival  of  Dionysius.2  Amethyst  ranked 
with  carnelian  as  a  favorite  stone  with  engravers,  and  it  was  of 
peculiar  traditional  service  in  the  fashioning  of  drinking  cups, 
from  its  supposed  checking  of  drunkenness,  whence  its  Greek 
name,  —  a,  "  not,"  and  /u,e0uw,  "  to  intoxicate."  Opals  were 
placed  in  the  first  rank  of  gems,  and  Pliny  tells  of  a  senator, 
Nonius,  who  bore  banishment  and  the  loss  of  all  his  estate 
rather  than  the  sacrifice  of  his  opal  ring  to  the  greed  of  Mark 
Antony.3 

Pearls  were  even  more  highly  valued  and  lavishly  displayed 
than  any  of  the  precious  stones.  Swelling  the  yield  of  the 
Mediterranean  shores  there  flowed  into  Rome  a  profusion  of 
still  finer  pearls  from  the  Persian  Gulf  and  Ceylon,  to  be  set  in 
necklaces,  bracelets,  earrings,  and  clasps  of  all  kinds.  Rich  robes 
were  bespangled  with  jewels,  and  it  is  reported  that  Lollia  Pau- 
lina, the  wife  of  Caligula  (A.D.  37-41),  wore  a  dress  covered  with 
pearls  and  emeralds.  Cleopatra's  famous  pearls  were  said  to 
have  cost  her  ^80,000.  Julius  Caesar  (B.C.  102-44)  gave  Servilia, 
Cato's  sister,  a  pearl  valued  at  over  ^£50,000,  and  Nero  dropped 
handfuls  of  pearls  in  the  laps  of  his  mistresses  (A.D.  54-68). 

From  personal  adornments,  the  decoration  of  arms  and  trap- 
pings, and  the  embellishing  of  banquets,  the  use  of  gems  spread 
to  the  mounting  of  pictures  in  frames  studded  with  precious 
stones,  and  the  ornamentation  of  statuary.  Nero  viewed  the 
combats  of  gladiators  in  a  mirror  of  jewels,4  and  Constantine 

1  "  Historia  Naturalis,"  XXXVII,  20. 

2  "A  Treatise  on  Gems,"  Feuchtwanger. 

3  "Historia  Naturalis,"  XXXVII,  21. 

4  Ibid.  XXXVII,  1 6.      Beckmann   thinks  the  mirror  of  Smaragdus  in  which 
Nero   gazed  may  have  been  green  obsidian,   green   jasper,   or   even   green   glass. 
"History  of  Inventions,"  III,  177. 


24        THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

challenged  the  splendor  of  Oriental  monarchs  by  his  entry  into 
Rome  in  a  chariot  of  gold  sparkling  with  precious  stones 
(A.D.  312-337). 

Amid  all  this  profusion,  in  which  millions  of  sesterces  were 
lavished,  the  diamond  is  noted  only  by  rare  allusions.  This  is 
probably  accounted  for  by  the  check  in  the  advance  of  lapidary 
art  on  reaching  a  stone  of  such  indomitable  hardness.  Even 
the  diamonds  set  in  the  clasp  of  the  regal  mantle  of  Charlemagne, 
after  the  opening  of  the  ninth  century,  show  only  a  partial  polish- 
ing of  the  natural  planes  of  the  crystals.  There  was  no  scientific 
cutting  of  facets  to  heighten  the  brilliancy  of  the  stone  until  the 
fifteenth  century.  When  artificial  shaping  was  attempted  before 
that  time,  it  did  not  go  beyond  the  production  of  a  flat  top  or 
table,  or  a  convex  surface,  with  a  truncated  pyramid  as  a  base. 
Even  when  a  large  number  of  facets  were  cut,  as  was  sometimes 

O  ' 

done  by  East  Indian  lapidaries,  there  was  no  scientific  propor- 
tioning, as  was  signally  shown  in  the  instance  of  the  remarkable 
stone  known  as  the  "  Beau  Sancy,"  which  came  into  the  posses- 
sion of  Charles  the  Bold,  Duke  of  Burgundy.  It  was  the  recut- 
ting  of  this  stone  in  1465,  by  the  true  artist  Louis  de  Berquem 
of  Bruges,  that  marks  the  rising  of  the  modern  art  that  has 
enhanced  so  immensely  the  resplendence  and  beauty  of  the 
diamond,  and  established  its  place  securely  as  the  chief  among 
gems  that  are  prized  for  adornment. 

Then  begins  the  entry  of  the  famous  diamonds  passing  over 
the  face  of  Europe  with  meteoric  trains  of  adventure.  The 
Beau  Sancy  glitters  for  a  moment  in  the  splendid  array  led  by 
Charles  the  Bold  against  the  Swiss  peasants.  On  the  bloody 
field  of  Granson  (3d  March,  A.D.  1476)  where  the  best  knights 
of  Burgundy  were  killed  or  put  to  flight  by  the  mountaineers, 
the  jewel  that  might  ransom  a  king  is  trampled  under  foot  in 
the  rout.  A  Swiss  soldier  picks  it  up.  It  is  no  more  in  his 
eye  than  a  bit  of  glass  which  he  is  well  pleased  to  sell  for  a  florin 
to  a  priest.  Philip  de  Commines  says  that  the  priest  knew  no 
more  of  its  value  than  the  soldier,  and  thought  he  did  well  to 
make  a  franc  by  selling  the  diamond  to  the  burghers  of  Berne. 


TH ! 


There  appears 

reappear  oi:  irer  in   i 

of  Portugal,  who  plet!-  :Vom 

Nichoh 

of  France.  soon  buys  it  oi. 

thousand  t:  !e  for  a 

of  his   kin^. 
When  i 
(1589),    M.  ii< 
him 

and  i_one 

So  his  body 
is   thro  his 

the  place  of  burial  is  later  Resent  weight,  531.*  carats. 
seai  \1.  de  Sancy,  the  1 

found  in  th  ;>mach. 

Undimmed  -cly  adventure,  it  r" 

to  shine  on  the  ;  jth  of  England 

From  the  la- 
the few  treas 
from  his  throne 
buys  the  gen 

ie  of  tru 
lution.     In  i 
bear  it  offwi 
years,  till  it 
the  Den 

less  a 

hand 
of  the  c< 
by  the  a 

1  "A  Treatise  on  ' 
Streeter. 


\    ;    /r   I 

>KjJ 
W 


ujth  ;;   trui: 
•  -t   f:uc:^-  \\ 


F    SOTf  if    AFKK'A 

monarchs         ;i:s  entry  into 
.ling    *irh         .  jous    stones 


sesterces  were 
cions.  This  is 

re  of  lapidary 
^-iness.  I'.ven 
?  I  harkmagnc, 
1  partial  jv>lwh- 

as  no  scientific 

•j.ne  until  the 
tempted  before 
f  a  flat  top  or 
mid  as  a  base, 
was  sometimes 
•-.-p^hc  propor- 
remarkable 


rhe 


!  he 

'<rd   by 

hioody 

•>'.  knights 

t.ntaineers, 

-ifr  foot  in 

.•>ri-  in   his 

'or  a  florin 


THE    ANCIENT   ADAMAS  25 

There  the  diamond  disappears.  One  current  story  makes  it 
reappear  one  hundred  years  later  in  the  possession  of  the  king 
of  Portugal,  who  pledges  it  with  other  jewels  for  a  loan  from 
Nicholas  Harlai,  Seigneur  de  Sancy,  and  treasurer  of  the  king 
of  France.  M.  de  Sancy  soon  buys  it  outright  for  one  hundred 
thousand  francs  and  loans  it  to  sparkle  for  a  time  on  the  head 
of  his  king,  Henry  III.  (A.D.  1574-1589). 
When  Henry  of  Navarre  comes  to  the  throne 
(1589),  M.  de  Sancy  sends  the  diamond  to 
him  by  a  trusted  servant.  Thieves  waylay 
and  kill  the  messenger,  but  the  precious  stone 
is  seemingly  not  in  his  keeping.  So  his  body 
is  thrown  into  a  grave  hastily  made  by  his 
murderers.  When  the  place  of  burial  is  later  The  Sancy. 

searched  out  by  direction  of  M.  de  Sancy,  the  lost  diamond  is 
found  in  the  dead  man's  stomach. 

Undimmed  in  this  ghastly  adventure,  it  rises  from  the  grave 
to  shine  on  the  breast  of  Elizabeth  of  England  (A.D.  1558—1603). 
From  the  last  of  the  Tudors  it  passes  to  the  Stuarts,  and  one  of 
the  few  treasures  that  James  the  Second  carries  off  in  his  flight 
from  his  throne  (A.D.  1688)  is  the  brilliant  Sancy.  Louis  XIV. 
buys  the  gem  from  the  king  in  exile  (A.D.  1695),  and  it  is  held 
as  one  of  the  most  precious  of  the  crown  jewels  until  the  Revo- 
lution. In  1792  robbers  break  open  the  treasure  chamber  and 
bear  it  off  with  other  plunder.  Again  it  is  beyond  tracing  for 
years,  till  it  reappears  in  the  hands  of  a  noble  Russian  family, 
the  Demidoffs,  from  whom  it  passes  to  London  merchants,  and 
finally  to  the  Maharajah  of  Puttiala.  It  may  be  that  the  adven- 
tures of  two  diamonds  are  fused  in  this  tale,  but  it  is  none  the 
less  an  outline  of  truth  with  the  marvel  of  romance.1 

Even  Aladdin's  wonderful  palace,  reared  in  a  night  by  the 
hands  of  obedient  genii,  scarcely  outstripped  the  glittering  show 
of  the  court  of  the  Great  Moguls,  enthroned  in  Delhi  (A.D.  1526) 
by  the  arms  of  the  Sultan  Baber  and  his  grandson  Akbar,  of  the 

1  "  A  Treatise  on  Gems,"  Feuchtwanger.  "  Great  Diamonds  of  the  World," 
Streeter. 


26        THE    DIAMOND    MINES   OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

line  of  Timour  the  Tartar.  Here  embassies  passed  through  the 
main  gate  of  the  palace  along  a  magnificent  avenue  to  the  grand 
central  square.  Thousands  of  bodyguards  in  splendid  dress  lined 
the  way,  and  behind  the  ranks  richly  caparisoned  elephants 
were  massed,  waving  flags  of  satin  and  silver.  Dark  eyes  peered 
through  the  crimson  hangings  of  the  howdahs  and  the  gilded 
lattices  of  the  zenana  cloisters  bordering  the  square.  Beyond 
the  cloisters  gardens  outspread,  with  beds  of  lovely  flowers  and 
sheltering  arbors  and  fountains  splashing  in  sculptured  basins. 

The  entrance  to  the  durbar  or  audience  hall  was  through  a 
pavilion  hung  with  tapestries  of  purple  and  gold  to  a  stately 
marble  chamber,  whose  pillars  and  walls  gleamed  with  rainbow 
hues.  Under  a  canopy  of  flowered  tissue  on  silver  poles  was  set 
the  imperial  throne,  the  matchless  triumph  of  Indian  art.  There 
strutted  two  peacocks  fashioned  deftly  of  jewels  and  gold  to 
depict  every  plume  and  hue  of  the  living  creature.  The  out- 
spread tail  seemed  to  flutter  in  mimicry  of  life  with  the  sheen  of 
sapphires  and  emeralds.  The  body  was  of  enamelled  gold  and 
the  eyes  two  radiant  diamonds.  Peacocks  were  emblems  of  the 
sun  and  of  the  descent  of  the  Great  Moguls  from  the  sun  through 
Chenghiz  Khan.  Ranged  beside  these  splendid  figures  were 
stands  bearing  masses  of  unfading  flowers,  for  every  stem  and 
leaf  and  petal  was  counterfeited  in  precious  stones  and  metals. 

When  the  Great  Mogul  took  his  seat  on  his  throne  of  solid 
gold  studded  with  jewels,  all  bent  low  before  his  imperial 
majesty  attired  in  cloth  of  gold  blazing  with  precious  stones 
in  armlets  and  necklaces  and  crusted  embroidery.  Over  the 
entrance  to  the  hall  was  engraven  in  letters  of  gold :  "  If  there 
be  an  elysium  on  earth,  it  is  this."  Here  was  at  least  a  splendor 
of  luxury  beyond  all  rivalry.  Never  was  shown,  in  vain  Babylon, 
adventurous  Tyre,  or  imperial  Rome,  any  display  as  dazzling  as 
the  jewels  of  Delhi.1 

1  "The  Turks  in  India,"  Henry  George  Keene,  London,  1879.  "His- 
tory of  British  India,"  Sir  W.  W.  Hunter.  Hunter's  "Indian  Empire." 
"Tales  from  Indian  History,"].  Talboys  Wheeler.  "Travels  in  the  East," 
Vol.  Ill,  Forbes. 


AW!  27 

Here  the  Ko!i-i-nur,  Mounts^  i  price- 

less trophy.      In  ?he  great  battle  of  i 
when  the  last  ei  of  the  Afghan  ' 

beaten  by  Baber,  the  Rajah  of  Gwa!  .ell,"  as 

Baber  wrote  g  I — valued  "at 

half  the  dai'  >  hole  wor'ii  " — came  in  tribute  to 

Humaiun,  ;  lere,  too,  were  the 

Koh-i-t  -nur,  Sea  of  Light, 

and  the  loon,  and  that  prodigy  of 

diamonds,  the  :o  Shah  Jehan  by  the 

Emir 

These  j  /eted  and  hoarded  with  insane 

passion  wh  her  lure  in  the    boasted  elysium  was    as 

Dead  .S  to  the  jaded  senses. 

Shah  Jehan,  dethroned  and  impris- 
oned at  Agra,  sank  to  dotage,  clasp- 
ing his  casket  of  jewels,  and  trickling 
diamonds  and  rubies  over  his  head 
and  breast.  When  his  son,  Aurung- 

zeb,  sent  a  messenger  to  borrow  some        V  \^^  <^\~-.\/ 
of  this  hoard,  the  resentful  old  man 
threatened  to  break  up  the  gems  in 

rr-.    Present  weight,  106  carats. 

a  mortar.    Shah  Rokh,  the  feeble  son 

of  Nadir  Shah,  who  broke  the  peacock  thrjt 

was  blinded  by  the  Aga  Mohammed  in 

the  Koh-i-nur.     Then  his  head  was 

ring  of  paste  to  hold  boiling  oil,  but  even  this 

onl  the  surrender  of  a  ruby  plucked  from  tfie  crown  of 

Aurunp  >hah  Zaman,  blinded  by  his  brother  Shuja,  hid 

the  Koh-i-nur  defiantly  for  years  in  the  plaster  of  his  prison 

cell ;  and  Shuja,  blinded  by  a  third  brother,  Mahmud,  yielded 

up  the  priceless  stone  to  Runjeet  Singh,  only  8  his  family 

from  agon; /-ing  death. 

In  the  sa  k  of  Delhi  by  Nadir  Shah  in  1739,  t^le  wonderful 

1  Memoirs  of  Sultan  Baber. 

1  "Voyage-  en  Turquie,  en  Perse  et  ttr  ,  Paris,  1676. 


><  HTTU    AI'kK  A 

s:ts  passed  through  the 

;  :uc;  -;e  to  the  grand 

i-.'idid  dress  lined 

i  -i:  ,    '  «iied    elephants 

1  ark  e\-.-s  peered 

'  ...vi  i:ii»s    ::nd    thr    gilded 

•  u     :%.f  Miuare.      Beyond 

.;t   i./volv  flowers  and 

!-i  sculptured  basins. 

;v;-e   hail   was   through   a 

i ••;  i   xuid   to  a  stately 

.:  ltd   with   rainbow 

I'ver  poles  was  set 

1   I  :..;i  jn   trr.     There 

and    gold    to 

The  out- 

"h^cn  of 

and 


m  penal 

stones 

(\er   the 

"If  there 

•  ;i  splendor 

-  .an  Babylon, 

as  da/zling  as 


^~y.  "Hts- 
V.UM  Empire." 
;n  the  East," 


THE   ANCIENT   ADAMAS  27 

Here  the  Koh-i-nur,  Mountain  of  Light,  sparkled,  a  price- 
less trophy.  .In  the  great  battle  of  Pariput  (April  2ist,  1526), 
when  the  last  emperor  of  the  Afghan-Lodi  dynasty,  Ibrahim,  was 
beaten  by  Baber,  the  Rajah  of  Gwalior  was  "  sent  to  hell,"  as 
Baber  wrote  grimly,  and  his  most  precious  jewel  —  valued  "at 
half  the  daily  expense  of  the  whole  world" — came  in  tribute  to 
Humaiun,  the  great  sultan's  favorite  son.1  Here,  too,  were  the 
Koh-i-tur,  Mountain  of  Sinai,  and  the  Darya-i-nur,  Sea  of  Light, 
and  the  Taj-e-mah,  Crown  of  the  Moon,  and  that  prodigy  of 
diamonds,  the  Great  Mogul,  presented  to  Shah  Jehan  by  the 
Emir  Jemla.2 

These  precious  stones  were  coveted  and  hoarded  with  insane 
passion  when  every  other  lure  in  the  boasted  elysium  was  as 
Dead  Sea  fruit  to  the  jaded  senses. 
Shah  Jehan,  dethroned  and  impris- 
oned at  Agra,  sank  to  dotage,  clasp- 
ing his  casket  of  jewels,  and  trickling 
diamonds  and  rubies  over  his  head 
and  breast.  When  his  son,  Aurung- 
zeb,  sent  a  messenger  to  borrow  some 
of  this  hoard,  the  resentful  old  man 
threatened  to  break  up  the  gems  in 

01      i     T>     i   i        i       c     \  i  The  Koh-i-nfir.     (Present  Cutting.) 

a  mortar,    bnan  Rokn,  the  feeble  son 

of  Nadir  Shah,  who  broke  the  peacock  throne  of  the  Moguls, 
was  blinded  by  the  Aga  Mohammed  in  the  vain  effort  to  extort 
the  Koh-i-nur.  Then  his  head  was  shaved  and  circled  with  a 
ring  of  paste  to  hold  boiling  oil,  but  even  this  intensity  of  torture 
only  forced  the  surrender  of  a  ruby  plucked  from  the  crown  of 
Aurungzeb.  Shah  Zaman,  blinded  by  his  brother  Shuja,  hid 
the  Koh-i-nur  defiantly  for  years  in  the  plaster  of  his  prison 
cell ;  and  Shuja,  blinded  by  a  third  brother,  Mahmud,  yielded 
up  the  priceless  stone  to  Runjeet  Singh,  only  to  save  his  family 
from  agonizing  death. 

In  the  sack  of  Delhi  by  Nadir  Shah  in  1739,  the  wonderful 

1  Memoirs  of  Sultan  Baber. 

2  "Voyages  en  Turquie,  en  Perse  et  aux  Indes,"  Tavernier,  Paris,  1676. 


28        THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

store  of  jewels  in  the  court  of  the  Mogul  emperors  was  borne  away 
by  the  plunderers.  It  is  supposed  that  the  Great  Mogul  was 
broken  at  that  time,  and  other  famous  diamonds  were  beyond 
tracing  for  years.  The  great  gems  were  still  more  widely  scat- 
tered upon  the  assassination  of  Nadir  Shah,  and  some  of  the  finest 
of  the  crown  jewels  of  Europe  have  probably  come  from  the 
hoards  of  Delhi.  The  Darya-i-nur  and  Taj-e-mah  were  set  in  a 
pair  of  bracelets  which  Sir  John  Malcolm  saw  at  the  court  of 
Persia,1  and  they  are  still  the  most  precious  of  the  jewels  of  the 
Shah.  Some  have  seen  in  the  Orloff  or  Sceptre  diamond  of  the 
Czar,  the  reappearance  of  the  Great  Mogul,  but  Streeter  thinks 
that  the  Great  Mogul  has  never  come  to  light  since  the  loot  of 
the  treasures  of  Nadir  Shah  by  the  Abdalli-Afghans. 

When  the  Koh-i-nur  came  into  the  hands  of  Runjeet  Singh, 
he  had  the  stone  set  in  a  bracelet  which  he  wore  proudly  on 
every  parade  day.  On  his  death-bed  he  sought  to  propitiate 
the  gods  by  presenting  this,  the  chief  of  his  jewels,  to  the  shrine 
of  Jaga-nath  (Juggernaut),  but  his  hand  was  too  weak  to  sign  the 
warrant  of  delivery.  So  the  gem  descended  to  the  young  rajah 

Dhulip-Singh,  and  was  held  until  the 
Indian  mutiny  and  the  seizure  of  the 
Punjaub  by  the  English  forces.  Then 
the  state  property  of  the  province  was 
confiscated  to  pay  debts  due  to  the  East 
India  Company,  but  the  Koh-i-nur  was 
reserved  for  the  English  crown,  and  on 
June  jd,  1850,  this  jewel,  from  earliest 
The  orioff.  tradition  the  emblem  of  conquest,  was 

placed  in  the  hands  of  Queen  Victoria  by  the  messengers  of 
Lord  Dalhousie. 

Every  precious  stone  of  uncommon  size  has  some  adventure 
to  tell,  though  its  tale  may  not  be  a  drama  of  as  many  acts  as  the 
Koh-i-nur's  career.  What  a  strange  story  might  be  drawn  from 
the  Orloff  of  the  sights  in  the  temple  of  Mysore,  when  it  was 
the  eye  of  the  Hindoo  god,  Sri-Ranga.2  There  was  no  other 

1  "  Sketches  of  Persia,"  Sir  John  Malcolm,  1827.  2  Ibid. 


AFRICA 


Present  weight,  194*  cnrats. 


>t  the  Moini!  emperors  was  borne  away 

supposed   that   the   drear  Mogul  was 

other   MPKHIS  diamonds  were   beyond 

eir   !„'•  •'!>>  vsere  <-riil  more  widely  seat- 

\a«jir  Siuih,  a iid  some  of  the  finest 

probably    conic   from   the 

.  u.i  ai:d  Taj-e-mah  were  sei  in  a 

Malcolm  saw  at   the  court  of 

o>t  i>recio','s  ot   the  jewels  ot  the 

h  !••?!' or  Sceptre  diamond  of  the 

Mouul,  but  Streeter  thinks 

>  iij.';ht  since  the  loot  of 

Afghans. 

i'  kunjeet  Singh, 

:   proudly  on 

:{!u   to  propitiate 

;,  to  the  shrine 

i  s  lu!...i  ---as  roo  ^\ik  ro  sign  the 

.--ided  to  rn^1  young  rajah 

•,;.",,  ami    \\»^    hi  Id  until    rhe 

,.lim    •      :  :••-    aiui   t'he    .ei/ure  of  the 

forces.    Then 

sfi'v  :\    of  tf       province  was 

i.-t  «>  the  Fast 

:    (  k  -»h-t  nur  was 

:  ..-AH,  and   on 

in.t'r.   earliest 

Conquest,  was 

•  ••.  : lie    -Messengers   of 

has  some  adventure 

],;i!!vi  of  as  manv  acts  as  the 

"  in  tie  ::>;>rs'  micrht  be  drawn  from 

(:-.-Mpit  of  Mvsorc,  wh.        •   was 

•   R  intri.-       'i'luie   w.is  ;    •   ..rher 


witness  of  the  ? 
a  devotee  on  ti- 
the precious  stone  «. 
to   Madras.      Here   tru 
^£2,000  for  his 
times  this  sum  v 
favor  of  the 

The  Rege 
gems  of  th- 
in the  bank 
1701,    c< 
the  s: 

first  opt  *>e  sei 

coast  and  to; 

mere'1 

big    diamond    was 

the  captain.    When 

open  sea,  he  flung  th  rboai 

to  drown,  and  took 

merchant,  from  wh< 

George,  Thomas  Pitt,  gr.i:i- 

It  was  one  of  the 
stone  weighing  410  " 
to   be    out  of  h; 
racked  by  the  fear  ot 
ful  gem  was  in  his  !-*  *  Mid 

at  a  i 

peace  of 

for  ^135,000  to 

minority  of  Louis  X 

made  une  of  the 

most  prodigal  and  luxu 

the  Bourbons  until  the 

stolen  by  the  robbers  who  earn* 


:h rough  r 


Weight  before  cutting,  410  carats; 
present  weight,  136}!  carats. 


arm- 

n  the 

stone 

iter  in  the 

was  held  by 

1792  it  was 

:y  and  thrown  into 


THE    ANCIENT   ADAMAS  29 

witness  of  the  sacrilege  of  the  French  grenadier,  masquerading  as 
a  devotee  on  the  black  and  stormy  night  when  he  plucked  out 
the  precious  stone  eye  and  ran  off  through  the  British  army  lines 
to  Madras.  Here  the  captain  of  an  English  ship  gave  him 
^2,000  for  his  prize,  but  it  cost  Prince  Orloff  more  than  fifty 
times  this  sum  when  he  bought  it  in  Amsterdam  to  win  back  the 
favor  of  the  Empress  Catherine. 

The  Regent  lies  in  state,  most  lustrous  and  precious  of  the 
gems  of  the  old  French  crown.  The  slave  who  found  it  buried 
in  the  bank  of  the  Kistna  River,  A.D. 
1701,  cut  his  leg  deeply  to  pouch 
the  stone  in  his  flesh,  and  wrapped  the 
wound  in  a  thick  bandage.  At  the 
first  opening  he  ran  away  to  the  sea- 
coast  and  found  refuge  on  an  English 
merchant  ship.  But  the  lure  of  the 
big  diamond  was  too  tempting  to 
the  captain.  When  his  ship  was  in  the 
open  sea,  he  flung  the  slave  overboard 

to  drown,  and  took  the  stolen  diamond  to  sell  to  an  Indian 
merchant,  from  whom  it  passed  to  the  governor  of  Fort  St. 
George,  Thomas  Pitt,  grandfather  of  the  great  Earl  of  Chatham. 

It  was  one  of  the  largest  of  all  known  diamonds,  the  rough 
stone  weighing  410  carats,  and  Thomas  Pitt  would  not  suffer  it 
to  be  out  of  his  sight  or  touch  day  or  night,  though  he  was 
racked  by  the  fear  of  thieves  and  murderers.  While  the  alarm- 
ful  gem  was  in  his  keeping,  it  is  said  that  he  never  slept  twice 
under  the  same  roof,  and  moved  from  place  to  place  in  disguise, 
at  a  moment's  caprice,  to  cover  his  tracks.  Fortunately  for  his 
peace  of  mind,  as  well  as  his  purse,  he  was  able  to  sell  his  prize 
for  ^£135,000  to  the  Duke  of  Orleans,  Regent  of  France  in  the 
minority  of  Louis  XV.  (A.D.  1715-1723).  So  the  splendid  stone 
made  the  fortune  of  the  house  of  Pitt,  and  came  to  glitter  in  the 
most  prodigal  and  luxurious  court  of  Europe.  It  was  held  by 
the  Bourbons  until  the  French  Revolution,  and  in  1792  it  was 
stolen  by  the  robbers  who  carried  off  the  Sancy  and  thrown  into 


30        THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

a  ditch  in  the  Champs  Elysees.   Here  it  was  picked  up  with  other 
plunder  which  the  thieves  did  not  dare  to  keep  or  offer  for  sale. 

Then  it  was  uplifted  again  to  the  French 
crown  and  has  held  its  place  through 
revolutions  that  have  unmade  kings  and 
emperors. 

So  it  might  be  told  how  "  The  Flor- 
entine "  wandered  from  India  through 
Tuscany  to  the  Austrian  crown,  —  how 
the  "  Piggott  "  saw  Clive's  conquests 
(A.D.  1751-1767)  and  travelled  to  Eng- 
land with  the  governor  of  Madras  and 

was  crushed  to  powder  by  the  dying  Ali  Pasha,  —  how  the 
"  Star  of  the  South  "  made  its  way  from 
the  sands  of  Brazil  to  glitter  on  the 
breast  of  the  fantastic  Gaikwak  of  Baroda 
while  he  killed  disagreeable  people  with 
diamond  dust,  —  and  how  banished  con- 
victs won  their  pardon  from  the  Portu- 
guese crown  by  the  discovery  of  the 
Braganza,  the  largest  diamond,  if  genu- 
ine, that  the  world  ever  saw.1  Thepiggott. 

No  one  can  say  of  a  true  diamond 
story,  "  it  is  closed  "  ;  for  diamonds 
outlast  dynasties,  and  their  wander- 
ings may  be  on  the  verge  of  renewal 
when  they  seem  to  be  ended.  "  A 
jewel  may  rest  on  an  English  lady's 
arm  that  saw  Alaric  sack  Rome,  and 
beheld  before  —  what  not  ?  The 

The  Star  of  the  South. 

1  "  Great  Diamonds  of  the  World,"  Streeter.  «<  Diamonds,"  W.  Pole, 
London  Archsological  Trans.,  London,  1861.  "  Diamonds  and  Precious  Stones," 
H.  Emanuel,  London,  1865.  "Outlines  of  Mineralogy,"  J.  Kidd,  Oxford. 
"Traite  Complet  des  Pierres  precieuses,"  Charles  Barbot,  Paris,  1838.  "The 
People  of  India,"  J.  Forbes  Watson  and  J.  W.  Kaye,  Editors.  "  Gemmarum  et 
Lapidum  Historia,"  etc.,  Boetius,  1647. 


p  of  t!1 
vulgar  pro  i 
at  the  amph 

the  peacock 
Armenian  t. 
last,  come  ! 

The 
made 
origif 

been  fouiv 

I    ^^V\ 
\  x\ 


i.        1  ne 
ting    the 


at 


1 


:-in\J>    MINIvi    Oi-    SOUTH    AFRICA 


yst'Ch.    Here  ;t  was  picked  up  with  other 

L-S  '.ii-d  not  vitirc  to  ka      -jr  ortcr  for  sale. 

Then  it  v\as  uplifted  i^.iin  fo  the  French 
h.is  he  :ts  place  through 
?!-.;U  h;i'  v  •,  i  a  made  kings  and 


Present  weight,  133^  carats. 


Weight  before  cutting,  254!  carats; 
present  weight,  124^  carats. 


^i^h*-  he  :•>!(!  how   "  Tht  Flor- 

i   troiii    India    through 

-i.;uiy    :  >  tiic  AUS:.H.IM  crown,  —  how 

••  Fi^uo't       ,aw    Chve's     conquests 

and.  travelled  to  Eng- 

;nvernor  of  Madras  and 

t'asha.  —  how   the 


Present  weight,  82^  carats. 


Js,"  W.  Pole, 
c'.ious  Stones," 

Kidd,  Oxford. 
i«;S.  "The 
•  ( •••mmarum  et 


THE   ANCIENT   ADAMAS 


31 


treasures  of  the  palaces  of  the  Pharaohs  and  of  Darius,  or  the 
camp  of  the  Ptolemies,  come  into  Europe  on  the  neck  of  a 
vulgar  pro-consul's  wife  to  glitter  at  every  gladiator's  butchery 
at  the  amphitheatre ;  then  pass  in  a  Gothic  ox-wagon  to  an  Arab 
seraglio  at  Seville;  and  so  back  to  its  native  India,  to  figure  in 
the  peacock  throne  of  the  Great  Mogul;  to  be  bought  by  an 
Armenian  for  a  few  rupees  from  an  English  soldier,  and  so,  at 
last,  come  hither." 

The  illustrations  of  the  historic  diamonds  shown  in  this  chapter  have  been 
made  from  photographs  of  facsimiles  of  the  stones,  and  are  the  exact  sizes  of  the 
originals. 

Dana  and  other  mineralogists  mention  that  diamonds  in  the  form  of  cubes  have 
been  found.  While  one  might  expect  to  find  diamond  crystals  in  cubic  form,  as 
this  is  the  fundamental  form  of  the  isometric  system,  still  very  few  specimens  have 
come  under  my  own  observation,  and  none  until  within  the  past  two  years.  De 
Beers  Company's  Premier  Mine  has  produced  most  of  these,  while  a  few  are 
reported  as  coming  from  Bultfontein.  The  usual  form  of  these  diamonds  is  a 
cube  with  bevelled  edges,  representing  the  combination  oo  o  2  and  oo  o  oo. 
See  illustration  below. 


CHAPTER   II 


IN    TRADITIONAL    OPHIR    LAND 

CHILD  picking  a  shining  pebble  for  a  play- 
thing from  the  gravel  edging  a  river  —  was  this 
sport  of  blind  chance  the  revelation  of  the  mar- 
vellous diamond  fields  of  Africa  ?  In  narrow 
fact,  yes ;  but  in  a  wider,  truer  range  of  view, 
this  discovery  was  the  crown  that  sooner  or 
later  must  reward  the  search  of  daring  adventurers  and  the  push 
of  stubborn  pioneers  into  the  dark  heart  of  the  continent. 

There  was  no  chance  in  the  strain  of  pluck  that  braved 
strange  perils  to  reach  traditional  Ophir  and  the  pits  of  King 
Solomon's  mines,  that  wandered  far  in  quest  of  the  golden  cities 
of  Monomotapa,  that  tore  the  wilderness  from  the  clutch  of  the 
lion  and  vulture,  and  beat  back  the  frantic  impis  of  Tchaka, 
Dingaan,  and  Umsilikazi.  The  ardor  and  the  toil  and  the 
courage  and  the  blood  of  ten  generations  of  explorers  were 
spent  before  it  was  possible  for  a  little  child  to  play  pitch  and 
toss  with  the  pebbles  of  the  Orange  River  and  clasp  a  rough 
diamond  in  his  heedless  hand. 

Two  dominant  motives  were  fused  with  the  high-spirited  zeal 
for  exploration  that  so  signally  stamped  the  fifteenth  century,  — 
the  opening  of  an  all-sea  route  to  the  Indies,  and  the  grasp  of 
the  riches  of  lands  behind  the  veil.  In  the  unknown  there  is 
space  for  any  vault  of  fancy,  and  in  that  romantic  age  her  soaring 
wings  were  rarely  clipped.  One  may  be  moved  to  smile  at  the 
fantastic  visions  of  the  men  who  found  the  southern  waterway 
to  the  Indies,  and  added  a  new  world  to  the  old ;  but  there  will 
be  no  sneer  in  the  smile  of  any  one  who  can  measure  his  own 
debt  to  experience,  and  put  himself  back  five  centuries  to  stand 


-        Of  THE 

UNWERS«TV 

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IN   TRADITIONAL    OPHIR   LAND 


33 


on  the  deck  with   Cam,  Dias,  and  Da  Gama,  or  the  still  more 
greatly  daring  Columbus. 


Visschcr's  Map  of  Africa,  A.D.  1662.     (From  a  copy  in  the  British  Museum.)     Reproduced 
in  English  by  Guiljelmo  Blaeuw. 

But  who  can  to-day  feel  the  hopes  and  fears  that  shook 
those  strong  hearts  ?  Who  can  lay  the  course  for  their  clumsy 
caravels  over  the  unknown  stretches  of  ocean  ?  Who  can  sail 
on  with  them  day  after  day  and  night  after  night  without  a  chart 


34 


THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


or  buoy  or  beacon  or  surf-rocked  bell  ?  Who  can  start  from 
fitful  sleep  to  pierce  the  night  with  straining  eyes  or  watch  for 
the  glimmer  of  the  dawn  on  sea-girt  horizons  ?  Who  can  recall 
their  racking  fears  or  the  dazzling  images  ever  forming  and  dis- 


-  ~ 


^^^M;^te£.J5*-:< 


Visscher's  Map  of  Africa,  published  A.I).  1662. 


solving  in  the  alembic  of  their  fancy  ?  With  every  daybreak 
the  isles  of  Atlantis  might  spring  into  view,  or  gardens  fairer 
than  the  golden  Hesperides,  or  monsters  more  horrific  than 
dragons,  guarding  hoards  beyond  the  dreams  of  avarice,  or,  per- 


BI.AEUW'S  MAP  OK  AFRICA,  PUBLISH! 


Y-.tJh"  i    ."<    x"5"9!S  T 

xr^jt^^ 


(From  a  copy  in  the  British  Museum.) 


IN   TRADITIONAL    OPHIR   LAND  35 

chance,  even  the  realms  of  some  potentate  accustomed  to  make 
footstools  of  princes  with  stiffer  necks  than  haughty  Xerxes  or 
the  terrible  Tamburlane. 

Amid  the  drift  of  such  cloudy  conceits  there  was  one  more 
clearly  shaped  and  persistent  than  the  rest.  Somewhere  below 
the  equator,  in  the  unknown  expanse  of  Africa,  tradition  placed 
the  home  of  the  Queen  of  Sheba,  King  Solomon's  mines,  and  the 
marvels  of  Ophir.  Every  adventurer  skirting  the  South  African 
coast  hoped  to  touch  with  certainty  the  shore  of  this  delectable 
country.  The  alluring  recital  in  Kings  and  Chronicles  glittered 
before  his  eyes.1  In  fancy  he  saw  the  gathering  of  the  ships  in 
"  Ezion-Geber,  which  is  beside  Eloth  on  the  shore  of  the  Red 
Sea,"  and  how  this  fleet  came  to  Ophir  and  fetched  from  thence 
gold,  four  hundred  and  twenty  talents,  and  brought  it  to  King 
Solomon.  He  saw,  too,  the  coming  of  the  Queen  of  Sheba  to 
the  king  to  prove  him  with  hard  questions,  and  the  great  train 
that  followed  her  with  camels  that  bare  spices  and  very  much 
gold  and  precious  stones.  Then  it  was  told  him  how  the  queen 
was  overcome  by  Solomon's  wisdom  and  grandeur  until  "  there 
was  no  more  spirit  in  her,"  and  she  gave  the  king  one  hundred 
and  twenty  talents  of  gold,  and  of  spices  very  great  store,  and 
precious  stones.  Following  this  tribute  came  the  regular  flow, 
from  Ophir  to  Judea,  of  gold  and  gems  and  almug  trees  in  the 
transports  of  Tyre.  With  such  a  fountain  of  supply,  it  was 
easy  to  credit  the  wonderful  tale  of  the  targets  and  shields  of 
beaten  gold,  of  the  throne  of  ivory  overlaid  with  gold,  and  of  all 
the  other  displays  of  Solomon's  splendor.  If  the  king's  gold 
made  silver  to  be  in  Jerusalem  as  stones  in  the  eyes  of  the 
chronicler,  it  is  not  surprising  that  this  vision  came  down 
undimmed  to  the  days  of  Da  Gama. 

But  how  to  find  the  source  of  this  flow  was  the  puzzle  that 
faced  the  explorer.  Unfortunately  the  old  chroniclers  had 
omitted  to  give  any  landmarks  of  King  Solomon's  mines.  Sur- 
mise strayed  down  the  eastern  coast  of  Africa,  and  the  close 
commercial  connection  between  southwestern  Arabia  and  the 

1 1  Kings  ix.,  x  ;  2  Chronicles  viii.,  ix. 


THE   DIAMOND    MINES   OF   SOUTH   AFRICA 


Outline  Copy  of  the  Catalan 
(In  the  original  the  shore  line  has  almost  illegible  names, 

equatorial  coast  region  of  East  Africa  was  unquestionable. 
Herodotus  declares  that  East  Africa  at  its  furthest  known  limits 
supplied  gold  in  great  plenty  as  well  as  huge  elephants  and 
ebony.  The  Alexandrian  geographers  mark  rudely  the  East 
African  coast  line  to  Zanzibar,  and  attest  the  relations  between 


IN   TRADITIONAL    OPHIR    LAND 


37 


Mappermonde,  1375. 

which,  for  the  sake  of  clearness,  have  been  omitted  here.) 

this  coast  and  Arabia  Felix.  Eratosthenes  observes  that  naviga- 
tion extends  down  East  Africa  beyond  Bab-el-Mandeb,  "  along 
the  myrrh  country,  south  and  east  as  far  as  the  Cinnamon  coun- 
try, about  five  thousand  stadia."  Ptolemy,  in  the  second  cen- 
1  Strabo,  XVI,  Chap.  IV,  4. 


38         THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

tury  A.D.,  describes  quite  accurately  the  east  coast  of  Africa  as 
far  as  Zanzibar  and  Ras  Mamba  Mku.  His  information  was 
chiefly  derived  from  Arabian  merchants.  But,  as  Schlechter  has 
closely  pointed  out  in  his  admirable  monograph,1  there  is  no 
trace  or  hint  anywhere  during  the  Greek  and  Roman  periods  of 
antiquity  of  any  colony  or  emporium  south  of  the  Zanzibar 


Outline  Copy  of  the  Portolano  Laurenziano,  1351. 

coast,  and  not  long  after  the  time  of  Herodotus  the  gold  im- 
ports of  Arabia  had  shrunk  to  inconsiderable  importance.  With 
the  decline  of  the  Himyaritic  Kingdom  in  Arabia,  soon  after  the 
second  century  of  our  era,  there  was  a  falling  off  of  commercial 
enterprise  and  intercourse  with  Africa,  so  marked  that  even  the 

1  "  Periplus   of  the   Erythraean   Sea,"   Henry  Schlechter,   The  Geographical 
Journal  of  the  Royal  Geographical  Society,  July,  1893. 


EDRISI'S  MAP,  AO>.  1154. 


ANDREA  BIANCO'S  MAP,  A.D.  1436.    VENICE. 


IN   TRADITIONAL    OPHIR   LAND 


39 


notable  map  of  the  Arabian  Edrisi,  in  1154  A.D.,  shows  how 
slight  and  vague  was  the  advance  in  the  knowledge  of  the  Dark 
Continent  from  the  days  of  the  Alexandrian  geographers.  Still 
this  old  chart  gives  some  substantial  proof  of  the  communica- 
tion of  Arabian  traders  with  the  natives  on  the  East  African 
coast.  But  on  this  map  the  African  coast  appears  to  curve 


Africa  de  Mappermonde,  Juan  de  la  Cosa,  1500.  (This  map  was  made  only  fourteen  years  after 
the  discovery  of  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope,  and  is  one  of  the  earliest  known  maps  giving  the 
entire  contour  of  Africa  with  approximate  accuracy.) 

east  continuously  from  the  mouth  of  the  Red  Sea,  and  Edrisi 
was  plainly  ignorant  of  the  abrupt  trend  to  the  south  from  Cape 
Guar-da-fui.  Yet  he  shows  rudely  the  islands  lying  off  the  east 
coast  of  Africa,  and,  south  of  Sokotra,  traces  the  African  main- 
land in  three  divisions,  Zendj  (Zanzibar),  Sofala,  and  Vakvak. 

With  all  its  imperfections  this  Arabian  map  was  in  advance 
of  any  European  portrayal  of  South  Africa.  It  was  the  prevail- 
ing belief  in  the  Middle  Ages,  "  bequeathed  from  antiquity,"  as 


40        THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

Justin  Winsor  observes,  that  "  owing  to  the  impassable  heats  of 
the  torrid  zone,  it  could  not  be  discovered  whether  this  region 
were  inhabited  or  whether  land  existed  there."  Map  makers 
plainly  made  the  bounds  of  land  and  water  beyond  the  equator 
from  sheer  surmise,  and  the  confession  was  commonly  frank  that 
the  land  was  terra  incognita  and  the  ocean  a  sea  of  darkness. 
"  Most  famous  of  all  these  early  maps  "  (of  the  Atlantic  Ocean), 


Dutch  Ship  of  the  XVIIIth  Century. 

says  Winsor,1  "  was  the  Catalan  Mappermonde  of  1375."  It  was 
probably  the  one  best  known  by  the  sailors  sent  out  by  Prince 
Henry  of  Portugal,  in  the  year  1413,  to  follow  down  the  Atlan- 
tic shore  line  of  Africa.  On  this  map,  all  known  Africa  is 
bounded  on  the  south  by  a  line  drawn  eastward  from  Finisterra, 
off  the  mouth  of  the  Rio  Del  Oro,  about  23°  north  of  the 
equator,  nearly  across  the  continent  to  the  Egyptian  Nile.  In 
the  Portolano  Laurenziano  of  1351,  the  outline  of  Africa  is  given 

1  "  Narrative  and  Critical  History  of  America,"  Vol.  I,  p.  55,  Justin  Winsor. 


IN   TRADITIONAL    OPHIR   LAND 


Dutch  Ships  of  the  XVI Ith  Century. 

an  approach  to  reality  that  is  highly  remarkable,  but  it  is  clearly 
a  happy  stretch  of  guesswork.1 

All  of  the  region  south  of  Cape  Non  was  practically  un- 
known to  the  adventurers  of  the  fifteenth  century.2  Their  ears 
were  filled  with  doleful  tales  of  the  calms  and  storms,  the 


Dutch  Ships  of  the  XVI  Ith  Century. 

1  "  Life  of  Prince  Henry  of  Portugal,  surnamed  the  Navigator,  and  its  Results," 
R.  H.  Major,   London,  1868. 

2  Chief  of  the  charts  in  the  fifteenth  century  were  those  of  Andrea  Bianco, 
"Atlas,"  1436,  and  "  Carta  Nautica."     Justin  Winsor,  "Narrative  and  Critical 
History  of  America,"  Vol.  I,  p.  55. 


42         THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

mud-banks  and  the  fogs,  of  the  Sea  of  Darkness.     If  by  any 
stretch  of  daring  they  might  cross  the  equatorial  line,  they  were 


Dutch  Ship  of  the  XVI Ith  Century. 

burdened  with  the  fear  that  they  would  begin  to  slide  down  an 
inclined  plane  with  a  rush  that  would  pitch  them   headlong  into 


Dutch  Ships  of  the  XVIIth  Century. 

some  bottomless  abyss.     The  only  assurance  of  a  happier  issue 
was  the  bare  tale  of  old  Herodotus  of  some  nameless  Phoenician 


IN   TRADITIONAL    OPHIR    LAND 


43 


sailors  who  had  skirted  the  coast  south  from  the  Red  Sea  in  the 
days  of  Pharaoh  Necho  (610—594  B.C.),  and  returned  nearly 
three  years  later  through  the  Pillars  of  Hercules  and  the  Medi- 
terranean. These  sailors  brought  back,  with  their  load  of  ivory, 
feathers,  and  gold,  the  report  that  during  a  considerable  part  of 
this  voyage  they  had  the  sun  on  their  right  hand.  It  is  this 
detail  that  now  chiefly  confirms  the  story,  bat  this  was  beyond 
the  credence  of  Herodotus,1  and  it  would  seem  that  this  ancient 
mariner's  tale  was  soon  generally  disbelieved,  for  the  special 


Dutch  Ships  of  the  XVI Ith  Century. 

searches  made  in  the  Alexandrian  library  by  Eratosthenes  and 
Marinus  of  Tyre  in  the  third  and  second  centuries  B.C.  brought 
to  light  no  other  records  or  traces  of  the  voyage.  So  it  was  not 
with  reliance  on  this  alleged  circumnavigation  that  the  adven- 
turers of  Portugal  groped  painfully  for  seventy  years  along  the 
coast,  until  the  daring  Dias  set  his  stone  crosses  at  Angra 
Pequena  and  Algoa  Bay  and  sighted  the  turning  point  of  the 
path  to  the  Indies  in  the  frowning  Cabo  de  Todos  los  Tor- 
mentos.2  King  John  was  quick  to  see  the  promise  in  the  land 

1  "  Herodotus,"  Bk.  4,  42,  Rawlinson.  ZA.D.  1486. 


44        THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

of  Dias  and  change  the  Cape  of  Storms  to  Cabo  de  Boa  Espe- 
ranza,  but  ten  years  passed  before  Vasco  da  Gama  followed 
down  the  trail  and  rounded  the  Cape  in  the  immortal  voyage 
that  reached  the  long-sought  Indies  six  years  after  Columbus 
had  touched  the  island  hem  of  the  new  world.1 


Dutch  Ships  of  the  XVIIIth  Century. 

The  completed  circling  of  Africa  by  European  adventurers 
was  a  no  less  memorable  achievement  of  Da  Gama.  He  touched 
at  Mozambique  on  the  first  of  March,  1498,  and  there  saw  gold, 
in  the  hands  of  Arabs,  that  had  passed  up  the  coast  from  Sofala. 
Nearly  twenty  years  before,  a  Portuguese  courtier,  Pedro  de 
Covilhao,  had  reached  Sofala  in  an  attempt  to  pass  to  India  by 
way  of  Egypt.2 

For  many  years  and  possibly  for  many  centuries  there  had 
been  a  trickle  of  gold  from  Sofala  through  Arab  traders,  and 
Da  Gama  saw  enough  of  it  to  move  his  king  to  lay  his  hands 
upon  it.  In  the  expedition  of  Cabral,  which  followed  in  the 
wake  of  Da  Gama  in  1500,  the  great  captain,  Bartholemeu 

1  "  Prince  Henry  the  Navigator,"  C.  Raymond  Beazley. 

2  "The  Portuguese  in  South  Africa,"  George  McCall  Theal.     "  South  Africa 
from  Arab  Domination  to  British  Rule,"  R.  W.  Murray,  editor,   London,  1891. 


IN   TRADITIONAL   OPHIR   LAND 


45 


Bias,  was  specially  commissioned  to  seek  the  source  of  the 
gold  stream.  Bias  was  drowned  in  the  storm  which  sunk  four 
ships  of  this  fleet,  but  Cabral  took  a  vessel  carrying  gold  from 
Sofala  and  sailed  to  Kilwa,  where  the  Arab  Ibrahim  and  his 
forefathers  had  been  drawing  gold  from  Sofala  for  a  long  term 
of  years.  Upon  the  report  of  Cabral,  Ba  Gama  turned  out  of 
his  way  to  Mozambique  in  his  second  voyage,  in  1502,  to  enter 
Sofala  and  take  possession  of  Kilwa,  and  three  years  later  Pedro 
da  Nhaya  sailed  from  Lisbon  with  six  ships  and  built  a  fort 
and  trading  station  at  Sofala. 

Behind  this  persistent  push  to  Sofala  there  was  more  than 
the  actual  showing  of  gold.  Here  was  one  of  the  traditional 
gateways  to  King  Solomon's  mines,  and  the  Portuguese  were 
quick  to  embrace  the  tradition.  They  gave  the  glittering  name 
of  Ophir  to  their  fort.  South  of  the  fort  there  runs  a  river, 
called  by  the  Arabs  Sabi,  and  this  was  pounced  upon  as  a 


Dutch  Ships  of  the  XVIIIth  Century. 

probable  twist  of  the  old  Hebrew  Sheba.  From  those  days 
Fort  Ophir  was  the  starting  point  of  Portuguese  adventurers 
in  search  of  the  fountain  head  of  Solomon's  treasures. 

The  Portuguese  then  had  uncommonly  sturdy  sea-legs  and 
asked  nobody  to  show  them  the  way  over  the  ocean  foam,  but 


46        THE   DIAMOND   MINES   OF   SOUTH   AFRICA 


IN   TRADITIONAL    OPHIR   LAND 


47 


they  were  far  less  ready  to  weary  their  legs  with  trudging  over 
mountain  ridges  or  scrambling  through  the  dense  thickets  of 
the  rugged  land  west  of  Sofala.  The  Arab  traders  were  more 
ready  to  venture  inland,  but  there  is  no  evidence  to  show  that 
any  of  them  went  farther  than  a  few  hundred  miles,  at  most, 
from  the  seacoast.  It  was  an  exceedingly  difficult  country  to 
penetrate,  and  the  savage  natives  were  jealous  of  any  approach, 
if  they  did  not  stubbornly  bar  the  way  and  murder  intruders. 


*  -  \ 

B!S«       I 

5:    ^^^mm./:^ 

V  --'     Dr 
Macloutsie 


Map  showing  the  Position  of  Ancient  Ruins  in  Rhodesia. 

The  horrid  death  of  the  first  Portuguese  viceroy  was  a  warn- 
ing that  struck  deep  into  the  hearts  of  the  earlier  adventurers. 
Francisco  d' Almeida,  returning  with  his  fleet  from  India  in 
1510,  touched  the  African  coast  near  the  first  landing  of  Diaz. 
To  resent  some  little  clash  with  the  nearest  native  tribe  he  led 
a  troop  of  soldiers  inland  to  surprise  their  village,  but  was  way- 
laid in  the  bush  and  his  troop  was  put  to  flight  by  a  hail  of 
darts  and  stones.  D'  Almeida  put  his  ensign  in  the  hand  of  a 
trusty  follower,  but  in  the  next  moment  he  was  stabbed  in  the 
throat  by  an  assagai  and  his  head  was  crushed  by  the  swing 


48        THE   DIAMOND    MINES   OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

of  a  knob  kerrie.  Sixty-five  of  his  picked  swordsmen  fell  with 
him  and  the  rest  only  saved  their  lives  by  abject  flight,  chased 
to  the  shore  by  a  little  band  of  naked  negro  dwarfs. 

This  was  the  greeting  of  a  weak  and  puny  coast  tribe.  What 
then  might  be  feared  from  the  rallying  of  the  fierce  and  stalwart 
blacks  of  the  Bantu  tribes,  under  some  ruthless  chief,  in  the 
fastnesses  of  the  mountain  land  encircling  the  gold  of  Ophir  ? 


Insiza  Ruins. 


Still  there  was  an  enticing  trickle  of  gold  dust  and  nuggets  from 
inland  mines  to  Sofala,  and  the  flow  of  resplendent  stories  was 
vastly  bigger  than  the  golden  stream  in  sight.  So  in  1569  it 
was  resolved  to  make  an  extraordinary  effort  to  penetrate  to  the 
source  of  the  gold.  The  East  African  coast  was  placed  under 
command  of  a  governor  independent  of  the  viceroy  of  India. 
Francisco  Barreto  was  made  the  first  governor,  with  instructions 
to  raise  a  force  of  a  thousand  men  and  lead  them  on  to  the 
capture  of  Ophir.  The  young  cavaliers  of  Lisbon  flocked 
eagerly  to  Barreto's  standard.  He  led  the  way  up  the  Zambesi 
with  a  high-spirited  troop,  but  the  gay  soldiers  were  soon 


IN    TRADITIONAL    OPHIR    LAND 


49 


scorched  by  the  sun,  torn  by  thorns,  and  cast  down  by  fevers. 
The  Kalangu  tribe  was  then  the  strongest  of  any  living  between 
the  Sabi  and  Zambesi,  and  Barreto  sought  to  win  the  good  will  of 
its  head  chief  by  offering  to  beat  his  rival.  This  offer  made  him 


Insiza  Ruins. 


welcome,  and  he  kept  his  promise,  but  he  was  soon  after  obliged 
to  appoint  Vasco  Fernandez  Homem  to  the  command  of  his 
troop  and  to  return  to  the  coast.  Homem  soon  followed  him 
with  the  dispirited  remnants  of  the  adventurers.  Barreto  did 
not  live  to  see  the  return  of  his  broken  expedition,  and  Homem 


50        THE   DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

succeeded  him  as  governor.  Then  the  new  governor  tried  an- 
other way  of  approach  to  the  gold  field,  and  finally  pushed  a  party 
through  from  Sofala  to  the  foot  of  the  mountain  which  the 
Kalangu  tribe  called  Fara  and  the  Arabs  Aufur,  transmuted 
forms,  it  was  thought,  of  the  Hebrew  Ophir.  Near  the  base 
of  this  mountain  were  placers  yielding  nuggets  worth  from  two 


Insiza  Ruins. 


to  three  thousand  dollars,  but  the  ordinary  toil  of  placer  wash- 
ing was  so  disgusting  to  the  Portuguese  visionaries  that  they 
gloomily  turned  their  backs  on  the  mines  of  Abasia  and  the 
rock  mark  of  Ophir  and  wearily  made  their  way  back  to  Sofala.1 
This  disappointment  dulled  the  glitter  of  some  old  stories,  but 
there  were  plenty  of  new  ones  to  dazzle  men's  minds. 

It  is  likely  that  the  most  accurate,  as  it  certainly  is  the  full- 
est extant,  account  of  the  mining  in  Ophir  land  is  given  in  the 
story  of  the  old  Spanish  author,  Joano  de  Barros,  whose  life 
spans  the  first  three  quarters  of  the  sixteenth  century.2  It  is 
too  much  to  expect  that  his  "  Da  Asia  "  should  be  free  from 
the  coloring  of  the  ardent  fancy  and  the  myths  of  the  age,  but 
underlying  his  narrative  there  is,  at  most  points,  a  credible 
basis  of  personal  observation  and  the  current  reports  of  many 
witnesses.  He  held  several  high  offices  in  the  Indian  and 

D 

1  "The  Portuguese  in  South  Africa,"  Theal.  "  Conferencias  Celebradas  na 
Academia  Real  das  Sciencias  de  Lisboa,  Acerca  dos  Descobrimentos  e  Colonisa- 
9068  dos  Portuguezes  na  Africa."  [At  Lisbon,  1892.] 

•  "Da  Asia,"  Joano  de  Barros  (1496—1570). 


IN   TRADITIONAL    OPHIR   LAND  51 

African  establishments  of  Portugal,  and  had  exceptional  oppor- 
tunities for  preparing  his  remarkable  memorial. 

In  his  description  the  "mines  of  Manica"  are  placed  "some 
fifty  leagues  west  of  Sofala."  The  Portuguese  league  was  3.84 
English  miles,  and  De  Barros  was  as  loose  as  contemporary  writ- 
ers in  the  measure  of  distances.  "  All  gold  found  there  is  in 
dust,"  he  writes,  "  and  the  workers  have  to  carry  the  earth 
which  they  dig  to  some  place  where  water  can  be  had.  Nobody 
digs  more  than  six  to  seven  spans  deep  (four  to  six  feet),  and  if 
they  go  to  twenty,  they  come  to  hard  rock." 

Beyond  the  Manica  placers,  in  positions  not  defined,  were 
the  mines  of  Boro  and  Quiticui.  There  nuggets  were  found 


Khami  Ruins. 


"  embedded  in  reefs  —  some  already  cleared  by  the  winter  tor- 
rents ;  hence,  in  some  of  the  pools,  such  as  remain  in  summer, 
the  miners  dig  down  and  find  much  gold  in  the  mud  brought 
up.  In  other  localities,  where  are  some  lagoons,  two  hundred 
men  set  at  work  to  drain  off  about  half  the  water,  and  in  the 
mud  which  they  sift  they  also  find  gold,  and  so  rich  is  the 


52        THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


ground,  that  if  the  people  were  industrious,  great  quantities 
could  be  had  ;  but  they  are  so  indolent  that  stress  of  hunger 
alone  will  keep  them  at  work.  Hence  Moors  (Arabs)  who 

visit  those  districts 
have  recourse  to  a 
ruse  to  make  them 
diligent.  They  cover 
the  negro  men  and 
women  with  clothes, 
beads,  and  trinkets  in 
which  they  delight, 
and  when  all  are 
pleased  trust  every- 
thing to  them,  telling 


Khami  Ruins. 


(.Jlem 


the  mines,  and  on  their  return,  they  can  pay  for  those  advances  ; 
so  that  in  this  way,  by  giving  them  credit,  they  oblige  them  to 
work,  and  so  truthful  are  the  negroes  that  they  keep  their  word. 
"  Other  mines  lie  in  the  district  called  Toroa,  ruled  by  a  vas- 
sal of  Benomotapa.  These  are  the  oldest  known  in  that  region. 
They  are  in  a  plain,  in 
the  middle  of  which 
stands  a  square  fortress, 
all  of  dressed  stones, 
within  and  without,  well 
wrought  and  of  marvel- 
lous size,  without  any 
lime  showing  the  join- 
ings. The  walls  of  this 
fortress  are  over  twenty- 


^^^^•^llf5^  *9S& 


' 


Gold  Ornaments  found  in  Ancient  Ruins. 


five  spans  high  (18  to  19 
feet)  but  the  height  is  not  so  great  compared  with  the  thickness. 
And  above  the  gateway  of  that  stronghold  there  is  an  inscrip- 
tion which  some  learned  Moorish  traders  who  were  there  could 
not  read  nor  say  what  writing  it  was.  And  around  this  build- 
ing are  others  on  some  heights,  like  it  in  the  stonework,  in 


IN   TRADITIONAL    OPHIR   LAND 


53 


which  is  a  tower  twelve  bracas  (72  feet)  high.  All  these  struc- 
tures the  people  of  the  country  call  Symbaoe,  which  with  them 
means  a  royal  residence.  They  stand  west  of  Sofala,  under 
latitude  20°  and  21°  south,  one  hundred  and  seventy  leagues 
more  or  less  in  a  straight  line.  ...  In  the  opinion  of  the 
Moors  who  saw  them,  they  seemed  to  be  very  ancient  and  were 


Khami  Ruins. 


built  there  to  hold  possession  of  those  mines,  which  are  very  old, 
from  which  for  years  no  gold  has  been  taken  owing  to  the  wars." 
The  latitude  and  position  of  the  Symbaoe  of  De  Barros  cor- 
respond closely  with  the  site  of  the  ruins  of  Zimbabwe,  described 
three  hundred  years  later  by  the  explorer  Karl  Mauch.  Both 
Zimbabwe  and  its  antique  form,  Symbaoe,  are  plainly  versions 
of  the  local  Bantu  nzimba-mbuie,  a  house  of  the  chief.  It  is 
true  that  the  Zimbabwe  of  Mauch  is  only  two  hundred  and  forty 
miles  west  of  Sofala,  but  the  leagues  of  the  old  chroniclers  were 
not  laid  off  with  the  tape  line. 


54        THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF    SOUTH    AFRICA 

Who  was  this  Benomotapa  whose  vassal  was  housed  in  such  a 
castle  ?  —  the  mighty  black  sovereign  of  whom  Camoens  sings  — 

"  Ve  do  Benomotapa  o  grande  imperio, 
De  Salvatica  gente,  negra  e  nua." 

In  dull  fact  Benomotapa  was  simply  the  corrupted  plural 
form  of  Monomotapa,  signifying  Lord  of  the  Mountain,  or  by 
a  possible  stretch  of  derivation,  Master  of  the  Mines.1  This 
was  one  of  the  hereditary  titles  of  the  head  chief  of  the  Kalangu 


Khami  Ruins. 

tribe,  the  largest  and  strongest  of  any  then  living  between  the 
Sabi  and  Zambesi.      His  dwelling  was   at   the  foot  of  Mount 

1  "The  Portuguese  in  South  Africa,"  George  McCall  Theal. 

Bent  says  the  name  Monomotapa  should  be  written  Muene-matapa,  or  "  lord 
of  Matapa,"  simply  "  a  dynastic  name,  just  as  every  petty  chief  in  Mashonaland 
to-day  has  his  dynastic  name,  which  he  takes  on  succeeding  to  the  chiefdom." 
"The  Ruined  Cities  of  Mashonaland,"  p.  285.  Both  titles  have  in  fact  the  same 
meaning  :  the  first  components  bena  and  mono  being  the  still  current  Bantu  words 
bwana,  bana,  muene,  mwana,  that  is  'lord,'  'master,'  'chief,'  'ruler.'  The 
second  part,  motapa,  common  to  both,  probably  means  a  mine,  from  the  Bantu 
word  tapa='to  dig,'  'excavate.'  "Africa,"  Vol.  II,  p.  372.  (Stanford's 
Compendium.)  A,  H,  Keane. 


IN   TRADITIONAL    OPHIR   LAND 


55 


Aufur,  which  was  held  in  such  traditional  reverence  that  the 
chief  would  not  permit  the  Portuguese  to  ascend  it.  There  was 
nothing  of  imposing 
splendor  in  the  huts 
of  the  chief  who  re- 
ceived the  embassy 
of  Francisco  Barreto, 
but  no  lack  of  evi- 
dence could  prevent 
romance  from  creat- 
ing an  African  em- 
pire under  the  sway 
of  Monomotapa. 
Some  corner-stones 
for  this  structure  were 
found  in  the  remains 
of  the  works  of  a 
people  of  far  higher 
civilization  than  any 
of  the  existing  native 
tribes,  and  these  relics 
were  prizes  to  a  fancy 
that  clutched  greedily  at  every  drifting  straw  of  report,  tradition, 
and  myth  supplied  by  Arabs  and  negroes. 

Every  one  in  the  suc- 
cession of  romancers,  in 
the  sober  cloak  of  histo- 
rians, of  South  Africa 
would  outdo  his  forerun- 
ners in  inflating  the  bal- 
loon of  the  traditional 
empire.  The  old  Dutch 
writer,  Kleveer,  finally 
puffed  it  up  to  the  bursting  limit  by  bounding  it  "  on  the 
east,  south,  and  west  by  the  Atlantic,  and  north  by  the  king- 
doms of  Congo,  Abyssinia,  and  the  Zanzibar  country.  Even 


Zimbabwe  Ruins. 


Zimbabwe  Ruins. 


56        THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF    SOUTH    AFRICA 

Dapper,1  whose  really  great  work  is  by  far  the  most  important, 
comprehensive,  and  creditable  presentation  of  the  Africa  of  the 
seventeenth  century,  jots  down  gravely  most  fantastic  details  of 
the  empire  ruled  by  the  royal  line  of  Monomotapa.  He  paints 
a  mammoth  palace  with  four  grand  gateways  leading  to  a  succes- 
sion of  halls  and  chambers,  rivalling  the  handiwork  of  the  slaves 
of  the  lamp  of  Aladdin.  All  the  ceilings  of  the  rooms  were  gilt 
or  covered  with  golden  plates.  For  the  furnishing  of  sumptuous 


. , 

M«^^ 

" 


Zimbabwe  Ruins. 


couches  and  chairs  there  was  gilding  and  painting  in  rainbow  hues 
and  artful  inlaying  with  enamel.  Ivory  chandeliers,  hanging  on 
silver  chains,  filled  these  resplendent  halls  with  light.  When  his 
majesty  deigned  to  rise  from  his  imperial  bed,  he  was  clothed  by 
his  valets  in  garments  of  native  silk.  All  his  servants  approached 
him  on  bended  knees  and  served  him  like  dumb  slaves.  His 
table  service  of  the  finest  porcelain  was  decorated  with  wreaths  of 
gold,  cunningly  wrought  in  the  fantastic  forms  of  natural  coral. 

1  "  Naukeurige  Beschrijringe  der  Afrikaensche  Gewesten,"  etc.,  Dr.  O.  Dap- 
per, Amsterdam,   1668. 


IN   TRADITIONAL    OPHIR   LAND 


57 


Zimbabwe  Ruins. 


Two  pounds  of  gold  was  daily  spent  in  perfume  for  the  royal 
nose,  and  torches  of  incense  flamed  day  and  night  around  him. 
When  he  took  an  airing,  he  was  borne  in  a  gorgeous  palanquin 
on  the  shoulders  of  four  of  his  trembling  nobles,  and  his  head 
was  shielded  from  the  profaning  sun  by  a  canopy  studded  with 
precious  stones.  If  he  was  impatient  of  this  slow  promenade,  he 


Zimbabwe  Ruins. 


58         THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


might  mount  on  an  elephant's  back,  but  on  nothing  meaner,  for 
nobody  in  that  wonderful  country  would  ride  on  any  other  animal. 
It  is  small  wonder  that  the  court  of  monarchs  of  this  splen- 
dor, and  their  golden  cities  of  Davaque  and  Vigiti  Magna,  were 
ardently  hunted  for  by  adventurers,  thirsty  for  every  romance 
gilding  the  dismal  stretches  of  sand  and  thickets  and  rocks 
which  encircled  them  with  the  threads  of  a  trail  to  the  glittering 
realm  of  Monomotapa.  But  the  expeditions  of  Barreto  and 

Homem  were  so  painful,  costly, 
and  discouraging  that  for  many 
years  no  more  explorations  were 
undertaken  by  the  Portuguese 
crown.  The  spirit  of  chivalric 
adventure  drooped  low  after  the 
gallant  young  king  Sebastian 
fell  in  battle  with  the  Moors 
in  1578,  and  even  the  spirit 
that  had  so  greatly  spread  the 
commerce  of  Portugal  was  los- 
ing its  vigor.  There  was  a 
momentary  arousal  in  the  be- 
ginning of  the  seventeenth  cen- 
tury, when  some  rich  silver  ore 
was  sent  to  Lisbon  by  the 
governor  of  Mozambique.  It 
was  believed  that  this  ore  came 
from  veins  in  a  region  called  the 
Kingdom  of  Chicova,  stretch- 
ing north  from  the  bank  of  the  Zambesi:  but  there  was  no 

o 

definite  report  of  the  location.  Still  there  was  such  an  impulse 
in  the  sight  of  this  silver  that  the  order  was  sent  to  despatch 
five  hundred  soldiers  to  Chicova.  No  such  force  could  be 
mustered,  but  Nuno  Alvares  Pereira  set  out  from  Mozambique 
with  a  hundred  men.  Soon  Pereira  was  the  victim  of  jeal- 
ous maligning,  and  was  superseded  in  his  command  by  Diogo 
Sinoes  Madeira.  This  commander  succeeded  in  placing  a  few 


Zimbabwe  Ruins. 


IN   TRADITIONAL    OPHIR   LAND 


59 


trading  stations   along  the   Zambesi,   and   made   a   pretence   of 
opening  mines  by  shipping  some  little  silver  to  Portugal ;   but 


Zimbabwe  Ruins. 


after  a  dozen  years  of  costly  maintenance,  it  was  shown  by  the 
search  of  Pereira  that  the  pretended  discovery  of  silver  was  a 


Zimbabwe  Ruins. 


fraud,  and  disgusted  Portugal  abandoned  the  enterprise  in  I622.1 

1  "The  Portuguese  in  South  Africa,"  Theal. 


6o        THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


From  that  year  nothing  of  note  was  attempted  from  the 
stretch  of  seaboard  loosely  held  by  a  few  feeble  garrisons. 
Beyond  the  vague  traditions  and  romances  there  were  no  guide- 
books to  the  rich  realm  of  any  African  monarch,  and  there  was 
no  point  on  the  South  African  coast  outside  of  the  Portuguese 
strip  where  the  least  enticement  was  shown  to  any  visiting  ship. 
Nowhere  was  there  any  evidence  of  an  approach  to  civiliza- 
tion, and  there  was  not  even  the  gilding  of  barbarism.  The 

shore  tribes 
were  filthy, 
famine-hunted 
negroes,  who 
had,  at  most,  a 
little  ivory  or 
a  handful  of 
feathers  to  bar- 
ter for  trinkets. 
There  was  an 
intermixture  of 
blood  and  a 
medley  of 
tribes  and  tribal 
names  that 

confounds  any  tracing  of  distinction  beyond  a  few  blurred  divi- 
sional lines. 

When  the  Dutch  and  English  began  to  tread  upon  the  heels 
of  the  Portuguese  in  Africa,  in  the  opening  years  of  the  seven- 
teenth century,  the  tribes  of  the  extreme  south  and  along  the 
southwesterly  Atlantic  coast  might  be  roughly  grouped  under  the 
name  of  Hottentots,  or,  as  they  called  themselves  with  monstrous 
conceit,  Kwa-Kwa,  men  of  men.  In  this  assertion  there  is 
plainly  to  be  seen  the  origin  of  the  Arabic  Vakvak,  the  name 
sketched  in  by  Edrisi  on  his  map  beyond  Sofala.  The  south- 
east African  coast  was  held  by  tribes  of  the  wide-spreading 
Bantu  family,  lumped  together  by  the  Arabs  as  Kafirs.  Filtered 
in  between  the  Bantus  and  Hottentots  were  the  pigmy  Sana, 


Zimbabwe  Ruins. 


IN   TRADITIONAL    OPHIR   LAND 


61 


rudely  bunched  as  Bushmen.1  There  was  endless  wrangling 
and  fighting  among  the  tribes,  regardless  of  any  common  flow 
of  blood,  and  the  Bantus  and  Hottentots  were  continually  clash- 
ing like  wildcats.  Their  only  union  was  in  their  hate  of  the 
Bushmen,  who  were  hunted 
from  cover  to  cover,  to  hide 
in  crevices  in  the  rocks  or  in 
holes  in  the  desert  sand,  from 
which  they  might  sally,  wasp- 
like,  with  the  deadly  sting 
of  their  poison-tipped  arrows. 
In  view  of  the  repulsive 
face  of  the  South  African 
coast  lands  it  is  not  surpris- 
ing that  Francis  Drake  and 
many  other  bold  voyagers 
circled  the  Cape  of  Good 
Hope  without  landing  to 
seek  for  traditional  treasures. 
But  with  the  opening  of  the 
seventeenth  century,  Table  The  Old  East  India  House-  Leadenhaii  street, 

'  London. 

Bay  became  a  regular  stop- 
ping place  and  refitting  station  for  the  ships  of  the  English  East 
India  Company.  For  twenty  years  this  slight  hold  on  the  con- 
tinent was  maintained,  but  it  was  so  lightly  prized  that  it  was 
dropped  in  1620  by  a  shift  of  the  station  to  St.  Helena.  Thirty- 
two  years  later  the  Dutch  East  India  Company  took  formal 
possession  of  the  Cape  and  its  adjoining  bay  without  any  chal- 
lenging protest,  and  built  their  fort  Good  Hope  as  the  first 
stronghold  of  the  Dutch  dominion  in  southern  Africa.  With 
this  foundation  the  search  for  the  golden  realm  of  Monomotapa 
was  vigorously  and  persistently  revived. 

Jan  van  Riebeeck,  the  leader  of  the  Dutch  colonizing  expe- 
dition  and  the  first  commandant  of  the  fort  and  settlement  at 


1  "South  Africa,"    George  McCall  Theal,  London,  1888-1893. 
African  Tribes,"  Sutherland. 


f<  South 


62        THE    DIAiMOND    MINES    OF    SOUTH    AFRICA 

Cape  Town,  was  a  man  of  ardent  spirit  and  uncommon  energy. 
He  had  entered  the  company's  service  as  a  surgeon's  assistant, 
but  his  ambition  and  ability  had  soon  pushed  him  to  the  front 
and  marked  him  as  a  man  to  fix  and  strengthen  the  grip  of  the 
great  trading  company  on  the  turning-point  of  the  way  to  the 
Indies.  In  his  portrait  dark,  sanguine  eyes  are  set  under  a 
high,  full  forehead,  crowned  with  thick  waving  hair  of  a  cavalier 
cut,  in  keeping  with  his  trim  mustache.  His  well-moulded 
features  and  resolute  chin  have  the  stamp  of  refinement  as  well 
as  action.  He  quickly  put  his  hand  to  every  practical  device  to 
make  the  new  settlement  productive  and  self-supporting.  Nine 
months  after  his  landing  the  first  crop  of  wheat  was  reaped  at 
the  Cape.  In  the  following  year  he  set  out  vines  from  the 
Rhine.  In  his  own  vineyard  the  muscatel  grape  grew  luxuri- 


The  Landing  of  van  Riebeeck,  7th  April,  1652. 

antly,  and  a  few  years  later  he  made  the  first  Cape  wine,  a  high- 
flavored  Constantia.  In  the  same  year,  1658,  maize  was  brought 
to  the  colony  from  the  coast  of  Guinea  and  successfully  planted. 
To  the  introduction  of  the  olive,  particularly  urged  by  the  direc- 
tors of  his  company,  he  gave  unremitting  pains,  and  succeeded 
in  rearing  a  fine  grove  of  fruitful  trees  on  his  own  plantation  at 
Wynberg.  In  his  stretch  of  experiment  he  even  tamed  young 
ostriches  and  stocked  the  neighboring  islands  with  rabbits.1 

Such  a  man  was  not  likely  to  be  heedless  of  the  chances  for 

*"  South    Africa,"    Theal.       "On    Veld    and    Farm,"    Frances    MacNab, 
London,   1897. 


IN   TRADITIONAL   OPHIR   LAND 


the  possible  enrichment  of  his  company  by  penetrating  to  the 
seat  of  the  traditional  empire  and  possibly  to  King  Solomon's 
mines.  He  reckoned  that,  in  any  event,  his  exploring  parties 
would  be  likely  to  succeed  in  uncovering  ore  beds  of  some  use- 
ful metal,  if  not  of  gold  and  silver.  But  he  seems  to  have  had 
great  confidence  in  the  traditions  of  Monomotapa,  and  it  is 
known  that  he  had  before  him  the  highly  colored  work  of 
the  Dutch  traveller  and  author,  Linschoten,  as  well  as  current 


Portrait  of  Johan  Antonyse  van  Riebeeck. 
First  Commandant  of  the  Cape  of  Good 
Hope.  Born  1618,  died  January  18, 
1672. 


Portrait  of  Maria  de  la  Querellerie  of  Que- 
rellerius,  Wife  of  Johan  Antonyse  van 
Riebeeck.  Born  October  28,  1629,  died 
November  2,  1664. 


Portuguese  books  infused  with  the  romance  of  Africa.  His 
calculation  plotted  the  location  of  Davaque,  the  chief  seat  of 
the  splendors  of  Monomotapa,  at  a  point  828  miles  N.E.  of 
the  Cape  of  Good  Hope,  and  322  miles  W.  from  the  Indian 
Ocean,  curiously  near  the  present  Witwatersrand.  Davaque 
was  built  by  tradition  on  the  banks  of  the  river  Spirito  Sanctu, 
flowing  into  the  Indian  Ocean  at  Delagoa  Bay.  Nearer  still 
to  the  Cape  was  another  El  Dorado,  the  city  of  Vigiti  Magna, 
which  was  confidently  located  on  or  near  the  meridian  of  30°  S., 
and  not  much  more  than  three  hundred  miles  from  the  Cape. 


64        THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

The  first  push  into  the  unknown  land  north  of  Fort  Good 
Hope  was  made  in  1657  by  a  little  party  headed  by  Abraham 
Gabbema,  Fiscal,  and  Secretary  of  the  Council  of  the  colony. 
Gabbema  led  the  way  to  the  first  big  beacon  in  sight,  a  peak 
with  a  grotesque  flat  top  which  the  colonists  had  already  chris- 
tened Klapnuits,  or  night  cap  mountain.  Skirting  the  base  of 
this  peak  he  pushed  to  the  next  conspicuous  landmark,  bearing 
toward  the  west,  a  mountain  with  bare  rugged  pinnacles  of  rock, 
which  the  explorers  dully  called  Great  Berg,  and  gave  the  same 
name  to  the  river  flowing  below. 


Wine  Cellar,  Groot  Constantia. 

It  was  in  the  middle  of  October  when  the  party  set  out,  but 
this  was  the  prime  of  the  springtime  in  South  Africa.  On  the 
lower  slopes  of  the  Great  Berg  herds  were  grazing  that  had 
never  seen  the  face  of  a  white  man  nor  felt  the  sting  of  a  bullet. 

o 

Zebras  capered  over  the  hillsides,  the  unwieldy  rhinoceros  wal- 
lowed in  the  high  grass,  and  hippopotami  plunged  and  snorted 
in  the  turbid  rivers.  Every  step  of  the  way  was  a  new  wonder- 
ment to  the  explorers,  and  when  the  rising  sun  struck  the  moun- 
tain tops  with  its  flame,  two  transfigured  peaks  gleamed  like 
prodigious  gems  in  their  eyes,  and  were  forthwith  distinguished 


IN   TRADITIONAL    OPHIR   LAND  65 

as  Paarl  and  Diamant.  These  sunlit  crests  were  the  only  things 
in  sight,  however,  that  had  any  glitter  of  the  realm  of  Mono- 
motapa,  and  after  a  little  further  advance  into  the  unknown  field, 
Gabbema's  party  turned  back. 

The  next  excursion  was  more  daring.  By  promising  rich 
rewards  van  Riebeeck  formed  a  party  of  thirty  volunteers  headed 
by  Jan  Danckert.  They  took  along  a  small  stock  of  bread  on 
three  pack  oxen,  relying  for  their  main  supply  of  food  on  the  game 
which  they  might  kill  on  their  way.  These  hardy  volunteers 
plodded  north,  inclining  to  the  west  along  the  foot  of  the  coast 
range.  They  saw  whirlwinds  of  dust  and  a  few  roving  Bushmen, 
but  nowhere  any  trace  of  a  monarchy  except  what  they  called  "  A 
Kingdom  of  Moles,"  where  the  burrowed  ground  sank  under 
their  feet  and  they  could  hardly  flounder  along.  In  December 
they  reached  a  river  flowing  toward  the  Atlantic,  on  whose  far- 
ther shore  they  saw  a  herd  of  more  than  two  hundred  elephants 
feeding.  So  they  called  the  stream  Olifants  River,  a  name 
which  it  has  borne  since  that  day,  and  trudged  back  wearily  to 
tell  their  story  to  the  commandant  at  the  Cape.  Within  ten 
days  after  their  return,  January  20,  1661,  van  Riebeeck,  the  un- 
tiring, mustered  another  party,  of  thirteen  adventurers  and  two 
Hottentot  attendants,  and  sent  them  away  on  the  track  of  the 
discoverers  of  Olifants  River. 

Corporal  Pieter  Cruythof  led  off  this  party,  which  succeeded 
in  crossing  the  river  of  the  elephants  and  reaching  the  land  of 
the  Namaquas,  a  Hottentot  tribe  of  the  highest  class.  Here  the 
explorers  found  natives  who  had  rude  copper  ornaments  twisted 
in  tufts  of  their  hair,  and  wore  rings  of  copper  and  ivory  on 
their  arms.  They  entertained  the  white  visitors  with  cheering 
hospitality  and  gave  a  grand  dance  in  honor  of  the  embassy. 
This  was  the  nearest  approach  to  the  civilization  of  the  tra- 
ditional empire  that  had  hitherto  been  reached  by  Dutch  ex- 
ploration, and  the  return  of  the  adventurers  on  March  n, 
1 66 1,  after  forty  days'  wandering,  was  warmly  welcomed  by  van 
Riebeeck. 

Before  two  weeks  had  passed  he  had  another  excursion  under 


66        THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF    SOUTH    AFRICA 

way  led  by  Corporal  Meerhoff,  which  penetrated  into  Namaqua- 
land  farther  than  any  white  man  had  ever  gone,  but  brought 
back  bitterly  discouraging  reports.  It  was  learned  that  the 
Namaquas  had  uncovered  some  veins  of  copper  and  iron  ore 
and  had  some  crude  process  of  smelting  and  working  both 
metals,  but  it  did  not  appear  to  be  practicable  to  undertake  to 
open  mines  at  points  so  far  from  the  Cape  in  a  region  that  for 
many  months  in  the  year  was  a  torrid  desert.  There  was  no 
trace  of  gold  or  rumor  even  of  any  distant  land  of  gold.  Over 
every  day's  march  was  the  hanging  terror  of  death  by  thirst  or 
hunger  or  savage  attack. 

Still  the  unflagging  commandant  would  not  give  up  the 
search,  and  in  the  following  November  Corporal  Meerhoff 
went  back  with  another  party  of  volunteers  to  Namaqualand,  as 
second  in  command  under  Sergeant  Pieter  Everaert.  This 
expedition  was  better  equipped  for  exploration  than  any  previ- 
ous one  that  had  set  out  from  the  Cape,  and  it  was  three  months 
before  it  returned  to  the  Fort.  Yet  it  had  nothing  new  to 
tell  —  only  to  repeat  the  same  dreary  story  of  painful  tramps 
over  sun-scorched  sands  and  jagged  ridges  of  rock,  of  blinding 
whirls  of  dust  and  the  blare  and  clash  and  drench  of  terrific 
thunder-storms,  of  sleep  broken  by  nightly  alarms,  of  lurking 
Bushmen  and  prowling  lions.  One  of  the  party  had  been  gored 
and  trampled  to  pulp  by  an  elephant,  and  his  comrades  counted 
themselves  lucky  in  reaching  the  Cape  fort  empty-handed, 
gaunt,  and  footsore. 

Even  after  this  sickening  rebuff,  the  next  year  saw  a  renewal 
of  the  attempt  to  reach  the  elusive  empire  of  Monomotapa. 
Then  Sergeant  Jonas  de  la  Guerre  set  out  with  a  little  troop  of 
adventurers  not  yet  disheartened.  But  they  were  not  able  to 
push  their  search  into  Namaqualand  as  far  as  former  explorers 
had  gone,  for  they  could  not  find  a  mouthful  of  water  in  the 
desert  sands,  and  were  in  imminent  peril  of  dying  from  thirst. 
This  repulse  was  a  crushing  blow  to  the  stubborn  spirit  that  had 
borne  so  many  buffets.  The  enterprising  van  Riebeeck  had 
been  transferred  to  the  government  of  Java  in  the  previous  year, 


IN   TRADITIONAL    OPHIR   LAND  67 

and  his  successor  was  a  man  of  much  fainter  heart  and  energy. 
So  for  nearly  a  score  of  years  the  search  for  the  traditional 
empire  lagged,  although  there  was  a  considerable  show  of  less 
venturesome  prospecting.  One  notable  undertaking  was  the 
despatch  of  a  party  of  expert  assayers  and  miners  from  the 
Netherlands  to  Cape  Town  in  1669  by  the  Dutch  East  India 
Company,  with  instructions  to  search  for  any  promising  outcrops 
of  ore  in  the  region  of  the  Cape.  This  party  prospected  for 
several  years,  but  found  nothing  to  inspire  any  investment  in 
mining.1 

A  revival  of  the  dazzling  old  visions  came  in  1681,  with  the 
appearance  at  the  Cape  of  a  party  of  Namaquas  bearing  pieces 
of  rich  copper  ore.  This  exhibit  spurred  the  East  India  Com- 
pany to  direct  another  exploration  of  Namaqualand.  Then  the 
commandant  at  the  Cape  was  a  man  of  the  stamp  of  van  Rie- 
beeck,  commander  Simon  van  der  Stel.2  He  was  quick  to 
despatch  a  company  of  thirty  soldiers,  a  draughtsman,  and  a 
reporter  to  make  the  venture  so  often  tried  in  vain.  Again,  after 
months  of  struggle,  the  desert  drove  them  back.  Van  der  Stel 
then  resolved  to  make  an  effort  far  surpassing  any  put  forth 
before  by  adventurers  from  the  Cape.  He  formed  a  party  of 
forty-two  white  men,  soldiers,  miners,  and  draughtsmen,  with  ten 
Hottentot  servants  and  guides.  The  expedition  was  provisioned 
for  four  months,  and  equipped  with  two  boats,  a  train  of  wagons, 
several  horses,  and  a  herd  of  pack  oxen.  Ensign  Olaf  Bergh 
was  put  in  command  and  led  his  company  on  to  Namaqualand. 
But  it  was  the  same  old  story.  No  strength  of  men  or  oxen 
availed  against  the  desert.  No  rain  had  fallen  in  the  wilderness 
north  of  the  Olifants  River  for  twelve  months,  and  the  whole 
region  was  an  arid  waste  without  a  trickle  of  moisture.  So 
Bergh  and  his  companions  faced  about  in  despair,  and  marched 
back  to  report  their  failure.  Sergeant  Izaak  Schuyver  and 
another  forlorn-hope  party  tried  their  luck  in  the  following 
year,  and  pushed  over  the  desert  a  little  farther  than  Bergh,  but 
brought  nothing  back  except  a  sack  of  copper  ore  on  a  pack  ox. 

1  "South  Africa,"  Theal,  Vols.  I  and  2. 

2  Commander  from  I2th  October,  1679,  to  1st  June,  1691. 


68        THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

As  a  last  resort  the  unflinching  commander  van  der  Stel 
resolved  to  head  an  exploring  party  himself.  He  obtained 
special  permission  from  the  directors  of  the  East  India  Com- 
pany, and  his  expedition  was  ordered  in  keeping  with  his  distinc- 
tion as  the  head  of  the  Dutch  power  at  the  Cape,  and  with  the 
labors  and  perils  of  the  venture.  He  left  the  Castle  of  Good 
Hope,  August  25,  1685,  with  fifty-six  white  followers  and  a 
troop  of  Hottentot  attendants.  Twenty-three  wagons  and  carts 
were  packed  with  supplies.  Besides  the  draught  teams,  there 
were  two  hundred  spare  oxen,  thirteen  horses,  and  eight  mules. 
For  the  dignity  and  comfort  of  the  commander  there  was  a 
coach,  but  this  touch  of  parade  was  chiefly  introduced  to  impress 
the  native  tribes  and  possibly  a  negro  emperor  with  the  grandeur 
of  the  sovereignty  despatching  such  an  embassy. 

The  time  of  year  chosen  for  the  start  was  precisely  the  same 
as  that  picked  for  the  expedition  of  Bergh  two  years  before,  but 
the  difference  in  the  face  of  the  country  would  amaze  any  one 
who  had  never  seen  the  magic  of  rain-falls  on  South  African 
deserts.  Fresh,  juicy  grass  and  vernal  flowers  were  sprouting 
from  a  soil  of  seemingly  lifeless  sand.  Birds  were  building 
their  nests  in  the  leafy  thickets,  insects  were  creeping  or  buzzing 
in  swarms,  and  a  myriad  of  butterflies  were  fluttering  their  gay 
wings  over  the  green  sward  and  blossoms.  After  years  of 
drought  there  had  come  a  season  of  heavy  rains.  The  arid 
sands  were  soaked,  torrents  foamed  through  the  windings  of 
the  dry  water-courses,  and  the  region  north  of  Olifants  River, 
which  had  been  an  impassable  barrier  to  so  many  explorers,  was 
quite  easily  penetrated  by  the  cumbrous  procession  of  van  der 
Stel.  Van  der  Stel's  first  farm,  "  Constantia,"  was  near  Wyn- 
berg,  where  he  resided  until  he  resigned  and  retired  to  his  estate, 
"  Vergelegen."  The  fine  old  houses,  "  Constantia  "  and  "  Verge- 
legen,"  are  still  some  of  the  landmarks  of  these  sturdy  old  Dutch 
settlers.  They  planted  avenues  of  oaks,  camphor  trees,  and 
pines,  which  to-day  tend  to  make  Cape  Town  and  its  environs 
one  of  the  most  charming  spots  on  the  face  of  the  earth.  The 
old  picture  of  van  der  Stel's  house,  "  Vergelegen,"  shows  it 


• 


90fl9bia9i 


.§130 


JINKS    OF    SOUTH    AFRICA 

unflinching   commander    van    der  Stel 

i.-ring    party    him -c it".      He    obtained 

-   directors  of  the    Fast   India  Com- 

\vi ;  ordered  in  keeping  with  his  distinc- 

p  iwer  at  the  Cape,  and  with  the 

He  left  the  Cast  Is  of  Good 

rh    fifty-six  white   followers   and  a 

Twenty-three  wagons  and  carts 

ik.>!des   tlie  draught  teams,  there 

en    horses,  and  eight  mules. 

."inturt      !    tiu'       ">unander   there  was  a 

ot  parade  was       icri\   introduced  to  impress 

'•  possibly  a  negro  empi      r  with  the  grandeur 

i.:es|utching  such  an  embassy. 

v-hosen  tor  t'u-  start  w^.  precisely  the  same 
.xpc.lri'.n  of  Itr  f-\rs   before,  but 

Farmhouse  on  the  Farm  Groot  Cohstahtist.'rtear  Wynberg.    The  first  residence 
of  Simon  van  der  Stel,  and  now  owned  by  the  Cape  Government.     Tfifen 
farm  is  celebrated  for  its  wine. 

-cein.nu;'^    lifeless   sand.      H-.-.ls    were    building 
:itv  thvkcrs,  insects  wen:  <  reeping  or  buzzing 
•'.•rterrlies   w-cre   fluttering  their  gay 
•-•  .irti    and    blossoms.       After    years   of 
.0  ison   of    heavy    rains.       The    arid 
M';ik'  •  —     f'-'amed   through    r  .  *jgs  of 

i  ti:     region   north   «  River, 

barrier  to  so   n\  rers,  was 

cumbrous   pr  uf   van  der 

rst   farm,  *'  C"onsran:\.  >   near  Wyn- 

liv-  rcsi^Mcd  ar.d  i.  -'.;•,  d  to  his  estate, 
•>ld  houses,  "(  on>rantia  "  and  "  Verge- 
udmarks  of  th^se  sturdy  old  Dutch 
or    oaks,  camphor    trees,  and 
,l;u   tend   fo  tn.ike  C.  .qn1  Tou  n   anJ    its  environs 
••  harmincr  ^pors  or  the  f;uv  of  the  earth.      The 
•>-  in    der   Sre!\    house,   4l'  \\r^c-i"-jen,"    shows    it 


"'X 


IN   TRADITIONAL   OPHIR   LAND 


69 


partly  hidden  by  a  huge  camphor  tree,  which  measures  nine  feet 
in  diameter. 

As  the  expedition  advanced,  it  found  various  promising 
showings  of  copper  ore,  and  the  croppings  were  particularly  rich 
in  a  range  lying  a  little  below  the  meridian  of  30°  S.,  where  one 
peak  was  singled  out  as  "  copper  mountain."  Van  der  Stel  had 
succeeded  in  reaching  the  line  of  the  supposed  location  of  the 
golden  city  of  Vigiti  Magna,  and  he  pushed  his  search  along 


Vergelegen. 

this  line  to  the  Atlantic,  but  he  could  nowhere  pick  up  a  trace 
of  the  traditional  city  or  any  other  vestige  of  the  realm  of 
Monomotapa.  He  did  not  even  meet  with  any  strange  mon- 
sters or  romantic  adventures,  except  perhaps  the  charge  of  a 
huge  rhinoceros,  which  upset  his  coach  and  forced  him  to  fly  for 
his  life.  After  six  months  of  travel  his  notable  exploring  party 
came  back  to  the  Cape,  without  any  tidings  of  good  cheer  to 
the  founders  of  the  colony.  The  only  relic  of  the  tradition  of 
empire  left  in  the  lands  it  had  traversed  was  the  attaching  of  the 
name  of  Vigiti  Magna  to  the  great  river  first  shown  on  any  map 
in  the  chart  of  this  exploration.  It  had  found  rich  copper  ore 
in  Namaqualand,  but  the  deposits  were  too  far  from  the  base 


70          THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

of  transportation  and  supply  to  warrant  the  undertaking  of 
mining.1 

Van  der  Stel  was  fitly  rewarded,  four  years  later,  by  an  ap- 
pointment as  the  first  governor  of  the  Cape  Colony,  in  recog- 
nition of  his  exploring  enterprise  and  other  displays  of  energy  ; 
but  his  pricking  of  the  painted  bubble  of  Vigiti  Magna  was  a 
bitter  disappointment  to  the  Dutch  East  India  Company,  and  a 
grievous  thing  to  all  adventurers  filled  with  the  conceit  of  a  cen- 
tury of  tradition.  It  was  true  that  Davaque  or  some  other  glit- 
tering city  might  lie  farther  to  the  east  and  north  than  any  point 
yet  reached  by  Dutch  explorers,  but  with  the  growing  familiarity 
with  the  land  and  natives  of  southern  Africa  there  was  a  swelling 
discredit  of  the  fine  tales  of  the  Dutch  and  Portuguese  roman- 
cers. The  myth  of  the  realm  of  Monomotapa  was  practically 
starved  to  death  at  the  close  of  the  seventeenth  century,  and 
unfortunately  the  greatly  persistent  daring  of  the  Dutch  explor- 
ers grew  cold  with  its  impulse.  When  adventurers  began  to 
disbelieve  in  the  marvellous  empire  and  even  doubt  the  location 
of  the  mines  of  Solomon  and  the  throne  of  Sheba,  there  was  no 
very  potent  lure  in  the  dusty  karroos  and  rocky  ravines  of  South 
Africa*  No  discovery  of  ore,  except  possibly  of  the  precious 
metals,  was  likely  to  be  of  any  reward  to  a  prospector,  and  it 
was  even  questionable  whether  rich  veins  of  gold  or  silver  could 
be  successfully  opened  and  worked  at  any  considerable  dis- 
tance beyond  the  narrow  range  of  the  Dutch  settlement  at  the 
Cape. 

So  the  credulous  search  for  Ophir  and  the  mythical  realms  in 
Africa  came  to  an  end,  and  for  more  than  one  hundred  and  fifty 
years  there  was  little  life  in  the  tradition  of  King  Solomon's 
mines,  until  its  embers  were  rekindled  by  the  daring  advances 
and  glowing  fancies  of  the  intrepid  explorer,  Karl  Mauch.  In 
1858  Mauch  marked  the  Lydenburg  district  as  a  probable  gold- 

1  "South  Africa,"  George  McCall  Theal,  Vol.  I,  pp.  370-380. 

These  copper  mines  came  into  possession  of  an  English  company  known  as 
the  Cape  Copper  Company  in  1853,  since  which  time  copper  to  the  value  of 
^11,000,000  has  been  produced. 


IN   TRADITIONAL    OPHIR   LAND 


71 


field,  and  in  1871  he  won  the  honor  of  reaching  and  first  clearly 
describing  the  extraordinary  ruins  of  Zimbabwe  and  its  adjacent 
gold-fields.  Unfortunately  for  his  credit  as  an  archaeologist  he 
insisted  on  the  fancy  that  the  old  building  on  the  hill  was  a  copy 
of  King  Solomon's  temple  on  Mount  Moriah  and  that  the  lower 
ruins  reproduced  the  palace  inhabited  by  the  Queen  of  Sheba 
during  her  stay  of  several  years  in  Jerusalem.1  This  does  not 
impair,  however,  the  probable  accuracy  of  his  main  contention 


Boschendal. 


that  he  had  revealed  part  of  the  ancient  workings  of  the  people 
who  furnished  the  flow  of  gold  to  Arabia  and  Judaea  in  the  days 
of  King  Solomon.2 

^'The  Ruined  Cities  of  Mashonaland,"  J.  Theodore  Bent,  London, 
1896. 

2  "  It  was  really  (Adam)  Renders  who  first  discovered  these  ruins  three 
years  before  Mauch  saw  them,  though  Mauch  and  Baines  first  published  them  to 
the  world,  and  they  only  described  what  the  old  Portuguese  writers  talked  of 
hundreds  of  years  ago."  E.  A.  Maund,  "  Geo.  Proc.,"  February,  1891, 
p.  105. 


72         THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


Entrance  to  Boschendal. 


The  extent  of  these  old  workings  has  been  proved  beyond 
doubt  by  the  reports  of  Hartley,  Mauch,  Baines,  Nelson,  and 
later  explorers,  and  a  precise  and  graphic  study  of  Zimbabwe  and 

other  ancient  structures 
in  Mashonaland  was 
made  in  1891-92  by  J. 
Theodore  Bent  and  his 
associates  in  the  expedi- 
tion chiefly  promoted  by 
the  Royal  Geographical 
Society,  the  British  Char- 
tered Company  of  South 
Africa,  and  the  British 
Association  for  the  Ad- 
vancement of  Science.  Bent's  expedition  located  Zimbabwe  in 
latitude  20°  16'  30"  south,  longitude  31°  7'  30"  east;  slightly 
differing  from  the  position  given  by  Mauch.1  Bent  holds  that 
Zimbabwe  is  of  Abantu  origin  and  may  be  freely  translated 
"  Here  is  the  great  kraal," 
meaning  the  kraal  of  the 
native  head  chief  of  the  dis- 
trict. This  name,  however, 
marked  only  the  native  occu- 
pation of  the  buildings,  and 
Bent  sees  in  the  ancient  ruins 
and  workings  "  evidence  of  a 
cult  known  to  Arabia  and 
Phoenicia  alike,  temples  built 
on  accurate  mathematical  prin- 
ciples, containing  kindred 
objects  of  art,  methods  of 
producing  gold  known  to 
have  been  employed  in  the  ancient  world,  and  evidence  of  a 
vast  population  devoted  to  the  mining  of  gold." 

1  "  List  of  Stations  in  Mashonaland  astronomically  observed,  with  Altitudes," 
by  Robert  M.  W.  Swan. 


Boschendal. 


IN   TRADITIONAL    OPHIR   LAND 


73 


74 


THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


Lekkerwijn. 


Without  entering  into  the  varied  researches  supporting  the 
views  of  Schlechter,  Keane,  and  other  leading  authorities,  it  may 
be  observed  that  the  main  conclusions  pithily  summarized  by 

Professor  Keane  are  strongly 
backed.  Ophir  was  not  a 
source  of  gold,  but  its  dis- 
tributer, as  the  port  on  the 
south  coast  of  Arabia  through 
which  the  flow  of  gold  came 
by  sea.  It  is  identified  with 
the  Moscha  or  Portus  Nobilis 
of  the  Greek  and  Roman 
geographers. 

Havilah  was  the  land 
whence  came  the  gold  of 
Ophir,  a  great  tract  in 
southeastern  Africa,  lying 
north  of  the  Limpopo  and  largely  identified  with  the  range  of 
the  modern  Rhodesia.  The  ancient  gold  workings  of  this  region 
were  first  opened  by 
the  South  Arabian 
Himyarites,  who 
were  followed  (but 
not  before  the  time 
of  Solomon)  by  the 
Phoenicians,  and 
these  very  much  later 
by  the  Moslem 
Arabs.  Tharshish 
was  the  outlet  for 
the  precious  metals 
and  stones  of  Havi- 
lah, and  stood  probably  on  the  present  site  of  Sofala.  The 
Queen  of  Sheba  came  by  land  and  not  ovef  the  seas  to  the 
court  of  Solomon.  Her  kingdom  was  Yemen,  the  Arabia  Felix 
of  the  ancients. 


Lekkerwijn.     (Back  view.) 


IN   TRADITIONAL    OPHIR    LAND 


75 


Bien  Donne,  Drakensteiti. 

In  a  word,  the  "Gold  of  Ophir"  came  from  Havilah 
(Rhodesia),  and  was  worked  and  brought  thence  first  by  the 
Himyarites  (Sabaeans  and 
Minseans),  later  by  the  Phoe- 
nicians, the  chief  ports  engaged 
in  the  traffic  being  Ezion-geber 
in  the  Red  Sea,  Tharshish  in 
Havilah,  and  midway  between 
the  two,  Ophir  in  South 
Arabia.1 

For  sixty  years  from  the 
opening  of  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury there  was  no  considerable 
exploration,  or  even  prospect- 
ing of  any  consequence,  in  the 
region  north  of  the  meridian 

o 

passing  through  the  Olifants 
River.  Yet  even  in  this  ap- 
'A.  H.  Keane. 


Monomotapa,  The  Hon.  A.Wilmot,  1896. 


Overmantel  and  Old  Dutch  Relics.    (Lekkerwijn.) 


THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


Bien  Donn6,  Drakenstein. 

parent  cessation  of  enterprise  there  was  a  continuous  progress, 
almost  essential  to  the  successful  advance  of  later  exploration. 
The  Dutch  settlement  at  the  Cape  was  expanding.  Year  after 
year  pioneer  settlers  pushed  out  farther  from  the  Castle,  moving 

up  the  river  valleys,  and  cling- 
ing at  first  to  the  base  of  hill 
ranges  where  the  essential  sup- 
ply of  water  was  most  surely 
attainable.  After  the  taking  up 
of  the  choice  locations,  later 
comers  passed  on  over  the  open 
veld,  and  it  was  seen  that  there 
were  large  tracts  of  land,  un- 
suited  to  agriculture,  which 
would  serve  well  as  ranges  for 
cattle  and  shee^>. 

For    many   years,  however, 
the  raising  of  wheat  was  of  prime 
Donne,  Urakenstein.  importance   in  the  eyes  of  the 


IN   TRADITIONAL    OPHIR   LAND 


77 


Dutch  farmers ;  for  this  product  fetched  the  highest  price  rela- 
tively, and  any  surplus  was  eagerly  called  for  by  ships  that 

touched  at  the  Cape  or  by  the 

demand  for  the  supply  of  East 

Indian    settlements.       In     1685 

the    first    export    of   grain    was 

shipped,    and    strenuous    efforts 

were   made   to   extend   the   area 

of  land  in  cultivation.  A  bo- 
tanic garden  had  been  one  of 

the    early    undertakings    of    the 

company,  to  serve  as  a  nursery 

for  European,  East  Indian,  and 

native    plants,    and    under    the 

direction  of  Commander  van  der 

Stel  this  nursery  was  made  the 

pride  of  the  Cape  as  an  exhibit 

as    well    as    a    very    serviceable 

source   of   supply  of  seeds  and 

plants  for  the  garden  and  farm  lands.     The  growth  of  the  olive 

had  been  particularly  urged,  and  it  seemed  at  first  to  be  likely 

to  flourish,  but  the 
success  of  the  grove 
of  van  Riebeeck  was 
not  attained  by  plant- 
ers generally.  There 
was  a  considerable 
advance  in  vine  plant- 
ing and  the  produc- 
tion of  wine,  and  in 
1672  the  distillation 
of  brandy  was  begun. 

Doorway,  Palmeit  Vallei.  Jt  was   hoped  that  the 

Cape  wine  could  be  made  an  export  of  consequence,  but  the  taste 
of  the  Dutch  planters  preferred  a  sweet,  strong  fermentation  to 
clear,  light  wines,  and  they  lacked  the  skill  or  the  strong  desire 


Farm  House,  Klein  Drakenstein. 


THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


to  modify  their  product  to  compete  with  French  vine  growers.1 
So  the  only  considerable  consumption  of  Cape  wine,  outside  of 

the  colony,  was 
from  the  crews  of 
visiting  vessels. 

There  was  no 
lagging  on  the 
part  of  the  East 
India  Company  in 
efforts  to  stimu- 
late the  industries 
of  their  colony. 
Upon  the  revoca- 
tion of  the  edict 

(Oct. 


A  Wine  Farm  at  Klein  Drakenstein. 


28,  1685)  by  Louis  XIV.,  the  steadfast  Huguenots  were  forced 
to  seek  new  homes  in  foreign  lands,  and  many  were  cordially 
encouraged  and  aided  to  pass  over  sea  to  the  young  Cape  Colony. 


Muller's  Farm,  Achter  Paarl. 


Their  expert  knowledge  of  the  growth  of  the  vine  and  olive  was 

highly  valued,  and  it  was  also  desired  to  bring  in  tanners,  har- 

1  "  On  Veld  and  Farm,"  Frances  MacNab. 


IN   TRADITIONAL    OPHIR   LAND 


79 


Dutch  Farm  House. 

ness  makers,  wheelwrights,  metal  workers,  and  other  artisans  of 
essential  service  to  the  spreading  settlements  of  farmers.  In 
the  allotments  of  land  special  care  was  taken  to  distribute 
the  influx  of  foreign  blood 
so  that  it  must  necessarily 
fuse  with  the  main  body  of 
settlers.  This  design  was  so 
well  carried  out  that  in  a  few 
generations  the  only  abso- 
lutely distinct  survival  of 
this  Huguenot  migration  was 
the  perpetuation  of  the  old 
French  family  names.  But 
the  combination  of  these  two 
strong  strains  of  blood  made 
a  compound  of  remarkable 
character. 

Besides       this       promoted  Muller's  Farm,  Achter  Paarl. 


8o 


THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


immigration  of  men 
there  was  an  equally 
shrewd  effort  on  the 
part  of  the  company  to 
advance  the  breeding 
of  horses,  cattle,  and 
sheep.  Stallions  were 
imported  from  Persia 
to  improve  the  stock, 
which  had  been  falling 
off  in  size  and  quality 
though  increasing  in 
number.  Spanish  rams 
were  used  to  lay  the 
foundation  of  the  South 
African  breed  of  meri- 
nos, and  the  Angora 
goats  bore  transplacing 

Palmeit  Vallei,  Klein  Drakenstein.  excellently,        and       SOOtt 

browsed  greedily  on  the  coarse  grasses  of  the  Cape. 

By  the  advances  of  the  voortrekkers  or  pioneer  farmers  the 
range  of  settlement  was  extended  so  far  in  1761  that  the  start  of 

D  ' 


Muller's  Farm,  Achter  Paarl. 


IN   TRADITIONAL   OPHIR   LAND 


8r 


Mooi  Kelder,  Lower  Paarl. 

the  first  large  exploring  party  since  the  return  of  the  van  der 
Stel  expedition  was  made  in  that  year  from  a  rendezvous  near 
the  mouth  of  Olifants  River.  This  party  was  led  by  Captain 
Hendrik  Hop  of  the  burgher  militia,  and  was  made  up  of  seven- 
teen whites  and 
sixty-eight  half- 
breed  Hottentot 
servants.  It 
started  in  August 
and  advanced  on 
the  track  of  the 
former  expedi- 
tion, passing  the 
Copper  Moun- 
tains of  Little  Plaisis  de  Merle,  Groot  Drakenstein. 

Namaqualand,  and  reaching  the  river  Vigiti  Magna  on  Septem- 
ber 29.  This  river  was  familiarly  called  by  the  colonists  the 
Groote  (Great)  River,  and  held  this  name  until  both  the  tradi- 


82 


THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


tional  and  common  names  were  supplanted  by  a  new  christening 
in  1779,  when  Colonel  Robert  Jacob  Gordon,  commanding  the 

garrison  at  Cape  Castle,  led 
another  expedition  up  the 
river,  and  named  it  Orange 
in  honor  of  the  stadtholder. 

Hop's  exploring  party  met 
a  troup  of  giraffes  soon  after 
crossing  the  Groote  River, 
and  won  the  distinction  of 
furnishing  the  first  skin  of  a 
giraffe  from  South  Africa  to 
the  Museum  of  the  Univer- 
sity of  Leyden.  But  except- 
ing this  novel  chase  there  was 
little  to  attract  the  explorers. 
The  sun  scorched  them  relent- 

Donkerhoek,  Groot  Drakenstein.  i         i       •          i  i  i 

lessly  in  the  open  desert,  and 

they  could  nowhere  find  water  except  in  the  deep  sand-pits  dug 
by  the  roving  natives.  Sometimes  there  was  a  shallow  puddle 
at  the  bottom  of 
one  of  these  pits, 
and  even  when  the 
sand  was  barely 
moist,  further  dig- 
ging to  the  under- 
lying stone  would 
sometimes  yield  a 
trickle  of  water. 
Still  they  pushed 
on  stubbornly  to 
the  farthest  point 

Vet     reached     from  A  Wine  Cellar.     Herd  of  Cape  Goats. 

the  Cape,  in  latitude  26°   18'  S.,  before  turning  back  to  bring 
home  their  discouraging  story. 

It  was  thirty  years  before  this  advance  was  outstripped  by 


BJ  QJO 


M)    AilNK.s    Of     v        «  it      •>»  ML  A 

:e\v  christening 
.  ommanding  the 
(  "ape  -Castle,   led 

•   ffet  expedition     up     the 

and    named   it    Orange 
•:>ur  of  the  stadtholder. 

op's  exploring  party  met 
.  /p  of  giraffes  soon  after 
the     Groote    River, 
T,    the    distinction    of 
^he   first  skin  of  a 
^outh  Africa   to 
•f    the  Univer- 
But  except- 

i  f  there  was 
LA   RHONE,   GROOT   DRAKENSTE1N. 

explorers. 

lem  relent- 
^eNrrt,  and 
OLD    LE    ROUX. 


V-  " 


g  b;i.k   to   bring 
'-   Outstripped  by 


or    THE 

UNIVERSITY 

C41.I! 


IN   TRADITIONAL    OPHIR   LAND 


Willem  van  Reenen,  of  the  farm  Zeekoevlei  on  the  Olifants 
River.  This  adventurous  farmer  set  out  in  1791  with  four 
fellow  colonists  and  a  number  of  Hottentot  servants,  and  reached 
on  the  1 8th  of  November  the  end  of  the  trek  of  Captain 
Hop's  party.  Prowling  Bushmen  and  lions  beset  their  camps 
continually,  and  in  January,  1799,  they  had  to  beat  off  a  fierce 
swoop  of  a  party 
of  Namaquas.  Yet 
they  pressed  on 
until  March  14, 
when  they  came 
to  a  little  oasis 
which  they  named 
Modder  Fontein, 
or  muddy  spring. 
Then  they  turned 
back  after  a  few 
days'  rest,  and 
plodded  home  to 
the  farm  Zeekoe- 
vlei, which  they 
reached  on  the 
2Oth  of  June. 
They  had  killed 
sixty-five  rhinoc- 
eros and  six 
giraffes,  without 
reckoning  their 
bag  of  smaller  game,  and  brought  back  exultantly  wagon  loads 
of  copper  ore,  which  they  supposed  to  be  gold  until  their  hopes 
were  blighted  by  assayers  at  the  Cape.1 

The  depressing  reports  from  these  expeditions  were  not  the 

least  of  the  straws  that  finally  broke  the  back  of  the  Dutch  East 

India  Company.     For  nearly  a  century  and  a  half  their  colony 

in  South  Africa  had  been  a  continual  drain  and  burden.     All 

1  "  South  Africa,"  George  McCall  Theal. 


Tatr,  1757. 


84 


THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


An  Old  Farm  House,  Lower  Paarl. 


the  expedients  and  efforts  of  the  energetic  directors  of  the  com- 
pany in  the  seventeenth  century,  and  such  faithful  servants  as 
van  Riebeeck  and  van  der  Stel,  had  failed  to  develop  any  mines 
or  any  product  for  export  of  any  considerable  importance.  With 

the  beginning  of  the 
eighteenth  century  there 
was  an  evident  drooping 
in  the  enterprise  of  the 
company,  and  a  drift 
toward  hopeless  discour- 
agement, which  culmi- 
nated in  1794  with  the 
declaration  of  bankruptcy. 
The  company's  debt  was 
;£  1 0,000,000  sterling, 
and  its  credit  was  utterly  exhausted.  It  could  no  longer  under- 
take even  to  maintain  a  feeble  garrison  at  the  Castle  for  the 
defence  of  its  colony.  Issues  of  depreciated  and  irredeemable 
paper  had  driven  out  all  gold  and  silver  from  circulation  at 
the  Cape.  Debts  could  be  paid  in  this  paper,  which  was  legal 
tender,  but  nobody  would  receive  it  in  exchange  for  goods 
except  at  such  a  discount  that  there  was  a  general  resort  to 
barter.  Internal  trade  was  para- 
lyzed, and  a  little  wheat,  wine, 
and  tallow  was  all  that  could  be 
squeezed  out  of  the  colony  for 
export  to  Java  and  India.  The 
straggling  settlers  on  the  north- 
ern frontier  were  continually 

fighting       with        the        IshmaelitC  Farm  House,  Achter  Paarl. 

Bushmen,  and  the  Kafirs  on  the  northeast  were  still  more 
harassing  and  formidable.  Every  kraal  was  a  rude  fort  and 
every  family  a  garrison.  Ammunition  was  growing  scarce  and 
costly,  and  there  was  no  hope  of  succor  from  the  Castle  at  the 
Cape. 

In  view  of  this  patent  collapse,  the   stretching  out  of  the 


IN   TRADITIONAL    OPHIR   LAND 


strong  arm  of  Great  Britain  to  seize  the  Cape  in  1795  should 
have  been  as  welcome  as  rescue  to  a  wreck.  Then  for  the  first 
time  a  power  took  hold  of  the  way  station  of  East  Indian  trade, 
and  its  straggling  offshoots,  that  had  the  strength  and  the  skill 
and  the  far-reaching  conception  to 
do  more  than  repress  savage  on- 
slaughts and  defend  grazing 
grounds,  —  to  open  great  mines, 
to  convert  arid  karroos  into  irri- 
gated plantations,  to  extend  the 
network  of  railways,  and  stretch 
in  time  the  steel  band  of  civiliza- 
tion across  the  darkest  zone  of 
Africa.  This  Britannia  has  done 
and  is  doing,  either  in  her  imperial 
way,  or  by  the  hands  of  the  sons 
who  have  labored  to  make  her 


Brand  Solder  (Fire  Loft).     For  the 
prevention  of  fire. 


greater. 

But  the  coming  of  this  saving 
and  transforming  power  had  the  appearance,  at  the  time,  of  a 
hostile  attack.  The  Netherlands,  in  1793,  were  wholly  under 
the  thumb  of  the  new  French  republic,  and  war  was  declared 
against  Great  Britain  through  controlling  French  influence. 
There  had  been  some  revolting  against  the  further  collection 

of  taxes  by  officers  of 
the  East  India  Com- 
pany, but  the  colonists 
as  a  body  did  not  want 
any  foreign  interference. 
So  the  little  garrison  in 
the  Castle  at  the  Cape 
put  on  a  defiant  front, 
and  rallied  to  its  support 
a  number  of  burgher  volunteers  when  a  strong  British  fleet  sailed 
into  Table  Bay  in  the  first  week  of  September,  1795.  It  was  ap- 
parent, however,  even  to  the  boldest  Dutch  defender,  that  resist- 


86 


THE    DIAiMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


ance  was  hopeless,  and  Cape  Town,  with  its  castle  and  garrison, 
surrendered  to  Admiral  Sir  George  Elphinstone  and  General  Sir 
Alured  Clarke,  on  the  sixteenth  of  September.  So  was  ended 
one  hundred  and  forty-three  years  of  rule  of  the  Dutch  East 
India  Company,  and  from  this  date  British  ascendancy  in  South 
Africa  began.  There  was  a  brief  intermission,  it  is 
true,  some  years  later,  when  the  treaty  of  Amiens 

(1802)  transferred  the 
Colony  to  the  Ba- 
tavian  Republic. 
But  the  breaking 
out  of  war  again 
in  the  following 
year  ruptured  the 
treaty,  and  ex- 
posed the  Cape 
Colony  again  to  the  hazard  of  capture,  which  actually  followed 
early  in  January,  1806,  when  Cape  Town  was  retaken  by  Major 
General  David  Baird.  From  that  time  the  Cape  was  held  con- 
tinuously by  the  strong  arm  until  the  convention  at  London, 
August  13,  1814,  when  all  claims  of  the  Netherlands  to  South 
Africa  were  extinguished  by  cession,  and  Great  Britain  became  the 
heir  of  all  the  Dutch  advances  from  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope.1 

1  "  South  Africa,"  George  McCall  Theal.  "Precis  of  the  Archives  of  the 
Cape  of  Good  Hope,"  H.  C.  V.  Leibbrandt.  "South  Africa,"  Augustus  Henry 
Keane.  "Heroes  of  South  African  Discovery,"  N.  D'Anvers  (Henry  Bell). 


Fort  Good  Hope. 


:'t  wsiV  A 


M    -UR1CA 

•::istie  an  '  garrison, 

'Stone  and  General  Sir 

Briber.     So  was  ended 

ruie  of  the   Dutch   East 

;sh  ascendancy  in  South 

a    brief   intermission,   it    is 

^hen    the    treaty    of   Amiens 

iiSo2)     transferred    the 

|i  .    a  Colony  to  the  Ba- 

tavian     Republic. 

But  the  breaking 

out  of  war  again 

•'i    the    following 

•-  ruptured  the 

and     ex- 

rhc    Cape 

:  i!  lowed 

A  View  from  the  Kloof  Road  leading  from  the  Upper  Part  of  Cape 


. 

S;H-  v»,;s  held  con- 

.(.;,ti(»n   at   London, 

\erht-rlands  to  South 

rat  Britain  became  the 

t-f  Good  Hope.1 

'  the   Archives  of  the 
-iia,"  Augustus  Henry 
*  A  livers  '.Henry  Bell).. 


UNIVERSITY 

OF 


CHAPTER  III 

THE     PIONEER  ADVANCE 

HEN  Lord  Charles  Somerset  came  to  the  Cape 
as  the  first  Governor  of  the  Colony  after  the 
cession,  how  slight  and  infirm  was  the  hold  of 
any  civilization  on  the  indurated  barbarism 
of  the  vast  expanse  of  Africa  south  of  the 
equator!  In  the  three  hundred  years  that  had 
passed  since  Vasco  Da  Gama  made  known  the  bounds  of  the 
continent,  the  outer  rim  of  the  traditional  Ophir  land  had  barely 
been  pierced.  From  the  Atlantic  side  the  Portuguese  had  not 
pushed  beyond  a  fringe  of  trading  posts  on  the  Lower  Guinea 
coast,  and  were  clinging  feebly  to  insignificant  stations  along  the 
shores  of  the  Mozambique  channel:  The  Dutch  grip  was  more 
obstinate,  in  spite  of  all  disappointments,  but  the  range  of  their 
advance  was  only  a  few  hundred  miles  from  the  Cape,  and  out- 
side of  Cape  Town  the  population  was  a  mere  sprinkling  on  the 
face  of  the  land.  When  the  British  first  wrested  the  Cape  from 
the  Dutch,  Earl  Macartney,  who  held  the  government  in  1797, 
defined  by  proclamation  the  bounds  of  the  Colony.  It  only  ran 
east  to  the  Great  Fish  River  and  on  the  north  to  the  Zuurberg 
Mountains  and  the  southern  edge  of  Bushman's  land,  trending 
up  to  the  Kamiesberg,  and  thence  along  the  coast  to  Buffels 
River  in  Little  Namaqualand.  The  total  extent  was  roughly 
120,000  square  miles,  merely  the  extreme  tip  of  South  Africa, 
and  the  entire  population,  both  white  and  black,  was  reported 
to  be  less  than  62,000,  or  about  one  person  to  every  two  square 
miles.  This  was  a  petty  fringe  on  the  skirt  of  the  dark  continent. 
Not  only  was  the  Colony  weak  in  numbers,  but  it  was  seem- 
ingly without  any  uplifting  leaven  of  enterprise  and  ambition. 

87 


88         THE    DIAMOND    MINES   OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

For  generations  the  Dutch  settler  had  been  treading  in  the  foot- 
steps of  his  forefathers  without  any  wish  to  stride  ahead.  What 
they  had  done,  he  would  do  if  he  could.  No  new  way  of  work- 
ing or  living  or  thinking  was  as  good  to  his  mind  as  the  old  way. 
The  pioneer  farmer  and  grazier  had  often  been  constrained  to 
pack  all  his  goods  on  the  backs  of  oxen  or  in  a  wagon  with  his 
wife  and  children.  A  little  hut  of  "  wattle  and  daub  "  sheltered 
the  family.  Rude  frames  of  wood  overlaid  with  raw  hide  strips 
were  their  bedsteads,  and  sheepskins,  their  bedclothes.  They 
cooked  their  food  on  the  coals  of  wood-fires  or  boiled  it  in  an 
iron  pot.  They  cut  their  meat  with  clasp  knives  and  drank 
from  tin  cups.  A  big  chest  served  them  for  a  table.  Their 
house  floor  was  the  bare  earth,  unless  a  strip  was  covered  with 
a  wild  beast's  skin.  Their  children  were  brought  up  from  their 
birth  in  this  habit  of  life  and  the  lack  of  comforts  was  not  to 
them  a  privation.  Their  standard  of  living  was  scarcely  higher 
than  that  of  the  imported  Guinea  slaves  who  worked  for  them,  or 
of  the  native  tribes  that  surrounded  them.  Their  isolation  from 
civilized  society  and  their  life  in  the  wilderness  in  familiar  con- 
tact with  slaves  and  savages  was  inevitably  degrading.  When  the 
English  took  the  Colony,  there  was  not  a  bookstore  or  a  single 
good  school  in  it,  and  outside  of  Cape  Town  almost  the  only 
tutors  were  soldiers  who  were  allowed  to  live  with  the  farmers.1 
Still  there  was  one  sustaining  and  universal  spirit  which  kept 
even  the  rudest  grazier  from*  sinking  to  the  barbaric  level.  They 
clung  to  the  God  of  Israel  and  to  the  Bible  as  God's  revelation. 
They  never  wearied  of  searching  the  Scriptures,  and  they  prayed 
with  the  fervor  and  faith  of  the  old  Covenanters.  Their  creed 
was  the  strait  and  narrow  way  of  Calvinism  and  the  synod  of 
Dordrecht,  and  they  turned  to  the  Old  Testament  as  confidingly 
as  to  the  New  for  guidance.  They  recognized  the  holding  of 
slaves  as  a  practice  permitted  to  Israel,  and  they  made  bond  ser- 
vants of  the  Hottentots  in  their  apprenticeship  contracts.  In 
their  eyes  the  Bushmen  were  Ishmaelites  and  the  Kafirs  Philis- 

1  "South  Africa,"  George  McCall  Theal.      "Handbook   to  South  Africa," 
S.  W.  Silver  &  Co. 


THE    PIONEER    ADVANCE  89 

tines,  who  were  cumbering  the  ground  that  might  be  occupied  by 
God's  favored  people.1  But  the  settlers  were  phlegmatic  and 
peaceful  by  nature,  content  with  their  bare  living,  and  with  no 
ardor  for  extending  their  bounds  by  conquest.  An  extraordinary 
impulse  was  needed  to  convert  them  into  adventurers  and  wan- 
derers in  the  desert. 

This  impulse  was  given  by  the  capture  of  the  Cape,  the  influx 
of  jostling  immigrants  from  Great  Britain,  new  and  vexing  legis- 
lation, and  disasters  to  crops  which  exalted  the  comparative  value 
of  pasturage  lands.2  At  the  opening  of  the  administration  of 
Lord  Charles  Somerset  there  was  a  marked  effort  on  the  part  of 
the  Home  Government  to  promote  the  growth  of  the  Colony.  A 
regular  mail  packet  service  was  established  between  England  and 
the  Cape,  and  ^50,000  were  voted  by  Parliament  in  1819  to  be 
disbursed  in  aid  of  emigration  to  South  Africa.  This  contribution 
was  a  powerful  stimulus,  and  it  is  estimated  that  nearly  5,000 
new  settlers  of  British  birth  were  added  to  the  population  of 
Cape  Colony  from  March,  1820,  to  May,  1821. 

Unfortunately  the  South  African  climate  in  1820  and  the 
years  immediately  following  was  peculiarly  aggravating.  In  1819 
there  had  been  a  heavy  wheat  crop  and  the  consequent  tempta- 
tion to  farmers  to  extend  their  wheat  growing.  So  they  did,  but 
the  crop  of  1820  throughout  South  Africa  was  fatally  blighted. 
The  next  year's  crop  fared  no  better,  and  thousands  of  farmers 
were  ruined  and  brought  even  to  the  verge  of  starvation.  Rations 
were  distributed  by  the  Colonial  Government  in  the  fall  of  1821 
to  those  who  had  no  means  to  buy  food,  but  the  unrelieved 
suffering  was  widespread.  Following  hard  on  this  scourge  of 
blight  came  the  prodigious  floods  of  October,  1823,  when  it 
seemed  to  the  colonists  in  the  eastern  districts  as  if  the  heavens 
were  open  for  another  deluge.  Rain  fell  in  torrents  for  days 
without  ceasing,  and  overflowing  rivers  ran  foaming  to  the  sea, 
carrying  millions  of  tons  of  earth  in  their  turbid  floods  as  well  as 
the  shattered  houses  of  settlers  who  had  barely  time  to  fly  for 

1  "  Impressions  of  South  Africa,"  James  Bryce.      "South  Africa,"  Theal. 

2  "  Annals  of  Natal,"  John  Bird,  p.  505. 


90        THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

their  lives.  These  staggering  rebuffs  in  the  face  of  the  new  emi- 
grants were  greatly  demoralizing.  Some  fled  from  the  Cape  in 
despair,  and  many  more  wrote  home  to  their  friends  that  the  Col- 
ony was  hung  between  flood  and  famine,  and  that  the  greater  part 
of  South  Africa  was  a  dismal  Karrooland.  Still  there  was  a  notably 
plucky  rally  and  an  immediate  turning  to  other  resources  when 
wheat  cultivation  was  shown  to  be  an  uncertain  reliance.  Cattle 
and  sheep  breeding  was  largely  extended  at  once,  and  in  1828 
hides  and  skins  ranked  only  second  to  wine  in  the  list  of 
exports.1 

The  failures  in  wheat  growing  and  the  resort  to  pasture  land 
were  strongly  moving  influences  urging  on  the  advance  of  pio- 
neer settlers  from  the  southern  river  valleys  north  and  east  over 
the  veld  into  unclaimed  territory.  This  natural  flow  of  migra- 
tion was  greatly  swelled  and  impelled  by  the  clashing  of  the  old 
settlers  with  the  newcomers  from  Great  Britain,  and  by  their 
resentment  of  British  control  and  administration  measures.  By 
the  census  of  1819  the  white  population  of  the  colony  was 
42,217,  and  outside  of  Cape  Town  this  people  was  almost 
wholly  of  Dutch  descent  or  of  the  fused  Dutch  and  Huguenot 
strains.  It  was  inevitable  that  a  stock  of  such  breeding  and  tra- 
dition should  be  impatient  of  any  ordinances  or  ways  except  its 
own.  It  was  peculiarly  irksome  to  bow  to  a  nation  which  had 
captured  the  Cape  by  the  strong  arm,  and  was  only  represented 
by  a  small  minority  of  the" settlers.  The  inevitable  heart-burn- 
ing; was  aggravated  by  the  contact  and  rivalries  of  the  new  and 

O  OD  * 

old  settlers.  Neither  faction  had  the  knowledge  or  temper  to 
recognize  the  best  traits  in  the  other  and  show  tolerance  for  dis- 

o 

similar  habits  and  prejudices.  The  Dutch  boer  has  an  old 
Anglo-Saxon  root  and  is  simply  correspondent  to  the  German 
bauer,  a  farmer  or  countryman  ;  but  in  the  English  mouth  all 
the  Dutch  colonists  were  lumped  as  Boers,  and  in  the  English 
eye  Boer  was  too  often  confounded  with  the  clownish  boor. 
The  Boers  faced  this  contempt  with  a  glowing  resentment  that 
burned  like  a  slow-match. 

1  "South  Africa,"  Theal. 


THE    PIONEER   ADVANCE  91 

In  the  new  measures  of  government  there  was  a  succession 
of  vexations  also  to  colonists  attached  to  the  old  customs  and 
ordinances.  The  expense  of  the  new  colonial  establishment  was 
a  grievance.  The  adjustment  of  the  currency  aroused  bitter 
complaint.  The  substitution  of  English  for  Dutch  in  official 
papers,  and  the  abolition  of  the  old  Dutch  courts,  were  heavy 
humiliations.  But  the  keenest  resentment  was  excited  by  the 
measures  designed  for  the  protection  of  Hottentot  bond  servants 
and  free  natives,  and  the  emancipation  act  of  1833.  There  had 
been  a  rapid  increase  in  the  importation  of  slaves  from  Guinea 
after  the  first  conquest  of  the  Colony  by  the  British,  but  in  1807 
the  last  cargo  of  slaves  was  landed  at  Cape  Town,  and  the  slave 
trade  was  formally  brought  to  an  end  by  law  in  the  following  year. 
Still  the  colonists  continued  to  hold  and  breed  slaves  as  their 
fathers  had  done,  and  there  were  35,745  slaves  in  the  Colony 
when  the  emancipation  act  went  into  effect  on  the  first  of  Decem- 
ber, 1834.  These  slaves  were  valued  at  ^3,000,000,  but  only 
^1,200,000  were  appropriated  as  compensation  to  their  owners. 
The  loss  fell  heavily  on  many  owners  already  sinking  under  the 
weight  of  mortgages,  and  there  were  rumblings  and  outpourings 
of  bitter  indignation.  The  deficiency  in  compensation  was  called 
Imperial  confiscation,  and  the  Boers  resented  it  sorely,  not  merely 
on  the  score  of  the  loss  measured  in  money,  but  as  a  crowning 
instance  of  their  political  subjection.1  Alien  Imperial  rule  was 
the  deep-seated  grievance  which  was  the  underlying  and  impel- 
ling cause  of  the  extraordinary  exodus  from  Cape  Colony  called 
the  Great  Trek.2 

In  1835  Louis  Triechard  led  out  the  first  pioneer  company 
of  this  migration,  and  his  advance  into  the  wilderness  beyond  the 

o  * 

bounds  of  the  Colony  was  followed  by  a  succession  of  slow-mov- 
ing caravans  pushing  northeast  to  the  head  waters  of  the  Orange 
River  and  the  terraces  of  Natal,  and  moving  on,  in  course  of 
years,  across  the  Vaal  to  the  Limpopo  water-shed.  This  out- 
push  of  pioneers  in  large  parties,  overcoming  all  barriers  of 

1  "  Annals  of  Natal."  "  South  Africa,"  Theal.  "  The  Great  Trek,"  Henry 
Cloete,  her  Majesty's  High  Commissioner  for  the  Colony  of  Natal.  2  Ibid. 


92 


THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


mountains  and  deserts,  and  fearlessly  venturing  into  the  strong- 
holds of  the  fiercest  native  tribes,  undoubtedly  hastened  and 
secured  the  acquirement  of  the  marvellous  diamond  and  gold 
fields  of  South  Africa.  The  march  of  the  caravans  and  the 
winning  of  the  land  was  a  drama  full  of  barbaric  color  and 
movement. 

At  the  time  when  the  Cape  first  fell  into  the  hands  of  Great 
Britain,  there  was  an  insignificant  tribe,  the  Amazulu,  living  in 

kraals  on  the  banks  of 
the  river  Unvolosi,  which 
flows  into  the  Indian 
Ocean  at  St.  Lucia  Bay. 
In  their  name  there  was 
an  arrogance  of  high  de- 
scent, for  its  meaning  is 
"  the  people  of  the  sky  "; 
but  the  Amazulu  had  then 
nothing  else  to  brag  of, 
and  while  their  head  chief, 
Senzanzakona,  lived,  there 
was  no  terror  in  the  Zulu 
name.  But  there  was  a 
son  born  to  Senzanzakona 
in  or  near  the  year  1783  1 
who  made  the  Amazulus 
masters  of  a  region  far 
exceeding  any  bounds  of 
the  Kalangu  Monomotapa,  and  stamped  his  name  across  it  in 
indelible  blood.'2 

The  boy  was  called  Tshaka  or  Chaka,  which,  in  the  Sechuana 
tongue,  is  "  battle  axe."  There  is  another  tracing  of  his  name 
to  Cheka,  a  wasting  disease  afflicting  his  mother.  In  either 
translation  the  name  was  ominous.  But  this  chief's  son  had  no 
deformity  that  an  eye  could  see.  When  he  came  to  manhood, 
a  sculptor  would  have  picked  him  as  a  model  of  his  tall,  athletic 
1  «  South  Africa,"  Theal.  ««  Annals  of  Natal."  2  Ibid. 


/ulu  Chief  Get  away  o  and  Part  of  his  Family. 


THE    PIONEER   ADVANCE 


r 


race.  He  was  more  than  six  feet  in  height,  and  every  inch  was 
pulsing  with  vigor.  No  rival  could  leap  as  high  or  hurl  an 
assagai  as  far.  In  later  life  his 

o 

shapely  features  were  swollen  with 
ugly  passions  and  debauch,  and 
his  lithe  body  was  overlaid  with 
fat,  but  he  never  lost  the  beauty  of 
his  deep-set,  brilliant  black  eyes, 
fringed  with  their  long,  curved 
eyelashes. 

For  some  cause  Chaka,  while 
only  a  lad,  was  forced  to  fly  for 
refuge  to  Dingiswayo,  chief  of  the 
Abatetwa,  the  master  tribe  of 
the  district.  Under  protection 
of  this  chief  he  was  made  a  sol- 
dier, and  took  by  craft  the  head- 
ship of  his  own  Zulu  tribe  when 
his  father  died.  Then  he  was  Zulu  Prince- Dinizulu" 

able  to  betray  and  put  to  death  his  protector  Dingiswayo,  and 

spread  his  mastery  by  force  or 
terror  over  the  surrounding 
tribes.  As  he  grew  in  power  he 
showed  an  unfolding  genius  for 
war  and  command.  He  pressed 
every  young  and  strong  man 
within  reach  into  his  army.  He 
marshalled  his  men  in  impis  or 
regiments.  He  discarded  the  old 
bunch  of  assagais  and  armed  each 
man  with  a  single,  short-handled, 
long-bladed  unkonto  or  spear, 
and  protected  him  with  a  shield 
of  oxhide.  He  aimed  with  his 
weapon  to  make  every  fight  hand  to  hand,  where  every  man 
must  kill  or  be  killed.  If  a  soldier  lost  his  spear  he  was 


/ft 


Zulu  Family. 


94        THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF    SOUTH    AFRICA 

doomed  to  die,  unless  he  could  show  another  in  place  of  it,  torn 
from  an  enemy. 

No  barbaric  figure  was  ever  more  terrific  and  martial  than 
the  Zulu  soldier  in  war-dress.  Chaka's  hair  was  cut  close, 
except  on  the  top  of  his  head  where  the  thick,  crisp  locks  were 
matted  or  moulded  into  a  ring  made  of  a  tree  gum  and  polished 
to  the  likeness  of  ebony.  Thick  folds  of  otter  pelt  were  wound 
round  his  head  and  great  earrings  of  carved  sugar-cane  hung 
from  the  cut  lobes  of  his  ears,  which  were  covered  with  pads  of 


A  Zulu  and  his  Ten  Wives. 


jackal's  skin.  From  this  turban  projected  two  feet  or  more  a 
jet-black  crane  feather,  waving  with  every  toss  of  his  head.  A 
circlet  of  twisted  monkey  and  genet  skins  hung  over  his  breast 
and  back,  and  from  his  waist  a  thick  flexible  kilt  of  twisted  skins 
hung  to  his  knees.  Bands  of  short-cut  white  oxtails  circled  his 
legs  and  arms,  and  the  ruffles  round  his  ankles  made  his  bound- 
ing feet  oddly  like  the  winged  Mercury.  In  his  right  hand  he 
grasped  his  spear  and  swung  at  his  left  side  his  oval  shield  of 
white  oxhide.  Now  pin  with  thorns  a  dozen  bunches  of  the 
red  feathers  of  the  louri  in  the  crisp  tufts  of  his  crown  and  scat- 


j\  '.MONO    MINES    Oi     SOI  "I  »  .A 

•  .  ,t   ..  i  u  t;>s  lie  could  show  .iur»r!-:  'iUvf  ot  u,  torn 

•  >«*.'C  r>'.Ture    AUS  ever  JTH  •             -*i»    and   martial   than 

tidier    in    war-'  hair   was    cut  close, 

.t    the  top  of  his   hcKvi  ^Mtrr  rlnck,  crisp  locks  were 

'Moulded  into  i  PMC-  • -t  a  rrce  gum  and  polished 

.I-, /ness  ot'ebonv.  o  .  ot   otter  pelt  were  wound 

iis   head   and   urcaf   c.if  fit"  carved  sugar-cane   hung 

»•  It!'  Acre  covered  with  pads,  ot 


ZULU    IN   WAR   ATTIRE. 


:oi.,ted   rwo  feet  or  more  a 
?  t-vi.ry  toss  of  his  head.     A 
hung  over  his  breast 
flexible  kilt  of  twisted  skins 
>rr -cut  unite  oxtails  circled  his 
•.a  his  ankles  made  his  bound- 
ercury.      In  his  right  hand  he 
his   left  side  his  oval  shield  of 
- horns  a  dozen   bunches  of  the 
N-.I  tufts  of  his  crown  and  sxrat- 


THE    PIONEER   ADVANCE 


95 


Zulu  Kraal  and  Huts. 

ter  some  other  brilliant  feathers  on  a  circlet  above  his  breast, 
and  see  Chaka  dressed  for  parade.1 

Then  fancy  the  marshalling  of  an  army  of  men  like  him,  for 
the  chieftain  in  arms  was  one  of  ten  thousand.  When  the  lead- 
ing division  marched  on  in  review,  every  man  was  more  or  less 
closely  the  image  of  Chaka.  These  picked  men  were  his  Unbala- 
bale  or  Invincibles,  scarred  veterans  who  had  never  been  beaten. 
They  bore  white  shields  marked,  like  their  chief's,  with  a  black 
spot,  and  behind  them  followed  in  grade  of  honor  divisions  with 
red-spotted  shields,  gray  shields,  and  black  shields.  Only  the 
Invincibles  had  kilts  of  skins,  the  others  wearing  instead  a  trap- 
ping of  oxtails.  As  these  fierce  troops  marched  on  before 
Chaka's  keen  eye,  the  men  of  chief  mark  would  bound  from  the 
ranks  and  show  a  marvel  of  vaulting,  darting  to  and  fro,  whirl- 
ing of  spears  and  mimicry  of  fight,  in  which  few  athletes  could 
compare  with  the  supple  Zulu. 

In  formation  for  battle  Chaka  curved  the  van  of  his  impis 

1  "Annals  of  Natal,"  pp.  90-100. 


96 


THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


like  a  crescent.  He  called  the  end  his  horns  and  the  centre  his 
breast.  This  was  the  old  array  of  the  warring  Bantu  tribes,  but 
Chaka  greatly  strengthened  it  by  a  formation  behind  in  an 
oblong  block  of  men  held  in  reserve  to  repel  any  break  in  the 
crescent  or  reenforce  it  when  wavering.  His  force  of  disciplined 
soldiers  ranged  up  to  fifty  thousand  strong. 


Zulu  Hut  in  course  of  Construction. 


With  this  prodigious  engine  of  war  shaped  to  his  hand,  he 
overran  all  the  country  from  Delagoa  Bay  to  the  Unzimvulu 
River  and  far  into  the  interior,  scourging  its  face  mercilessly. 
Some  of  the  terrified  tribes  in  his  way  were  blotted  o*ut  com- 
pletely. "  There  was  a  white  mark  from  the  Tugela  to  Thaba 
N'chu,  and  that  was  our  bones,"  said  an  old  Hlubi  to  Theal,  the 
historian  of  South  Africa.  Sometimes  stragglers  escaped  to  lurk 
in  mountain  recesses.  These  wretched  survivors  of  the  scourge 
were  covered  by  one  new  and  pitiful  name,  Amafengu,  because 
their  first  cry  to  strangers  was  Fenguza,  "  we  want."  Only  one 
tribe  held  Chaka  in  check,  the  warlike  Amaswazi,  which  stub- 
bornly guarded  their  mountain  paths  and  cliffs.  Even  the  fierce 
Amangwane  were  forced  to  fly  before  Chaka's  resistless  impis ; 
but  they  kept  massed  together,  and  in  their  retreat  drove  off  or 
massacred  most  of  the  tribes  between  the  Orange  and  the  Vaal 
rivers.  Then  the  Amangwane,  still  hot  pressed  by  the  Zulus, 


THE    PIONEER   ADVANCE 


97 


began  to  rub  against  the  frontiersmen  of  Cape  Colony.  This 
inroad  was  bravely  met  by  a  muster  of  a  thousand  soldiers  and 
Boers  under  Lieutenant  Colonel  Somerset,  who  finally  put  the 
Amangwane  to  utter  route  in  a  sharp  battle,  August  27,  1828, 
near  the  banks  of  the  Bashil  River.1 

Chaka  was  a  warrior  capable  of  measuring  the  efficiency  of 
the  white  man's  organization  and  firearms.  When  the  Aman- 
gwane were  thrown  back,  the  Zulu  chief  withdrew  his  own  impis 
without  risking  a  collision  with  the  whites.  A  few  weeks  later 
he  was  murdered  by  two  of  his  half  brothers  and  his  best-trusted 
attendant.  Dingaan,  his  half  brother,  and  one  of  his  assassins, 
grasped  the  headship  of  the  Zulus,  but  his  succession  was  dis- 


Zulu  Woman  grinding  Corn. 

puted  by  the  commander  of  one  of  the  chief  divisions  of  Chaka's 
army,  the  unruly  Matabele.  This  revolting  chief,  Umsilikazi, 
was  the  model  of  a  Zulu  warrior,  tall,  sinewy,  shapely,  and, 
except  in  war  dress,  naked  save  for  a  cord  around  his  waist 
from  which  leopards'  tails  dangled.  A  string  of  little  blue 
beads  was  drawn  about  his  sturdy  neck,  and  three  green  feathers 
of  a  paroquet  were  stuck  in  his  crisp  hair.  His  followers  were 
like  him,  and  the  wild  charge  of  the  legion  of  such  men  armed 
1  "South  Africa,"  Theal.  "Annals  of  Natal." 


98         THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

with  their  keen-bladed  spears  was  a  sight  that  would  try  the 
nerve  of  any  white  soldier.  How  the  rudely  armed  and  undis- 
ciplined Boers  would  face  it  was  soon  to  be  tested. 

Umsilikazi,  revolting  from  Dingaan,  led  his  Matabele  divi- 
sion across  the  desert  to  fall  upon  the  country  north  of  the 
Orange  River  and  west  of  the  Drakensberg,  the  Dragon 
Mountains.  Much  of  this  country  had  been  ravaged  before 
by  the  Amangwane,  and  the  Matabele  spared  nothing  that  had 
escaped  slaughter  and  pillage.  Dingaan  sent  an  army  of  Zulus 
in  1834  to  dislodge  his  rival,  but  the  warriors  of  Umsilikazi 


'  '*    •   *^ 

"x 
\    « 

^  :ic3S 


Zulu  Women. 


beat  back  the  attack.  By  the  Zulu  raids  and  massacres  and 
wars,  the  whole  country  from  the  seaboard  of  Natal  nearly  to 
the  junction  of  the  Orange  and  Vaal  was  desolated,  and  the 
native  tribes  of  the  region  almost  destroyed.  Thus  great  tracts 
of  land  were  opened  to  the  advance  of  the  migrating  Boers,  but 
the  push  of  the  trekking  pioneers  soon  brought  them  in  conflict 
with  Umsilikazi  and  Dingaan. 

Then  the  remarkable  traits  of  this  peculiar  people  stood  out 
in  high  relief.  To  English  immigrants,  jostling  the  old  settlers, 
the  ordinary  Boer  appeared  a  Dutch  clodhopper,  sullen  and  jeal- 
ous, unkempt  in  person  and  dress,  immovably  set  in  his  traditional 
ways,  pig-headed  in  his  obstinate  prejudices,  a  block  to  every 
suggestion  of  progress,  Pharasaical  in  his  prayers,  absurd  in  his 


THE    PIONEER   ADVANCE 


99 


customs,  and  often  clutching  to  the  last  penny.1     There  were 
some  true  lines  in  this  partial  portraiture,  with  a  natural  warping 


Zulus  smoking  Indian  Hemp. 

of  prejudice  and  lack  of  insight.      In  face  of  the  foreign  intru- 
sion the  Boer  had  something  of  the  instinct  of  the  turtle  and 


Old  Zulu  Women  taking  Kafir  Beer  to  a  Wedding. 

1  "The  Great  Thirst  Land,"  Parker  Gillmore.  "South  Africa,"  George 
McCall  Theal.  "  South  Africa  ;  a  Sketch  Book  of  Men,  Manners,  and  Facts," 
James  Stanley  Little. 


ioo       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OE   SOUTH    AFRICA 


porcupine.  But  in  the  heart  of  the  wilderness,  in  his  venture- 
some trek  over  the  pathless  veld,  and  in  the  traverse  of  moun- 
tains and  deserts,  he  showed  what  scornful  eyes  had  not  seen, — 
the  self-reliance,  the  fortitude,  and  the  pluck  of  the  true  pioneer. 
He  packed  his  wife  and  children  and  all  his  needful  supplies 
in  a  huge,  low-bodied  wagon  under  an  arched  frame  covered  with 

waterproof  canvas.  To  this  stout 
wagon  sixteen  strong  oxen  were 
yoked  to  the  chain  or  rawhide  rope 
forming  a  trektouw.  Every  ox  was 
a  helpmate.  Every  one  knew  his 
name  and  place  and  resented  a 
change  in  yoking.  The  Boer  and 
his  Hottentot  helpers  spoke  to  them 
all  familiarly,  and  could  cut  at  will 
a  fly  from  the  ear  of  any  one  with 
a  flick  of  their  long-lashed  whip. 
When  these  prairie-schooners  lum- 
bered off,  creaking  and  swaying, 
with  a  chorus  of  Dutch  and  native  calls,  the  Beers  and  their 
sons  rode  beside  them  on  ungainly  flea-bitten  horses,  trained  to 
herding  and  hunting,  and  often  possessing  uncommon  bottom 
and  speed. 

The  Boer  was  by  nature  prudent  and  wary.  For  comfort 
and  safeguard  the  advance  of  the  Great  Trek  was  in  companies, 
camping  at  night  on  plain  and  hillside,  with  wagons  ranged  to 
form  a  rough  palisade  and  kraal.  No  morning  or  nightfall  ever 
passed  without  prayers  and  the  reading  or  recital  of  Scripture. 
For  every  step  of  his  way  he  looked  to  his  God  for  guidance, 
and  he  felt  that  the  old  promises  to  the  chosen  people  were 
renewed  to  him.  His  faith  in  the  literal  inspiration  of  the  Bible 
was  unwavering.  He  did  not  doubt  that  the  sun  stood  still  at 
the  call  of  Joshua,  or  wonder  at  the  slaughter  of  Philistines  with 
the  jawbone  of  an  ass.  In  face  of  every  privation  and  the  direst 
peril  he  was  sustained  by  his  certain  reliance  on  the  help  of  One 
who  could  make  a  spring  gush  from  the  desert  rock,  or  deliver 


Zulu  Girls. 


THE    PIONEER   ADVANCE 


101 


any  heathen  host  into  the  hands  of  a  few  faithful  servants. 
But  with  all  this  reliant  devotion  he  never  forgot  "  to  keep  his 
powder  dry,"  and  used  every  opportunity  to  perfect  his  skill  as 
a  marksman. 

Back  of  his  faith  and  prudence  was  an  unflinching  spirit.  In 
the  uncouth  Boer  smouldered  the  fire  of  an  ancestry  that  charged 
at  Ivry  and  starved  at  Leyden.  Even  the  women  and  children 
were  dauntless  at  the 
pinch  of  need.  With 
her  white  grease-cloth 
wrapped  about  her  face, 
the  Boer's  vrouw  was 
an  uncouth  object,  but 
with  her  eye  on  the 
sight  of  a  rifle  many  a 
fat  old  woman  was  a 
guard  to  be  feared. 

No  impediments 
nor  dangers  stayed  the 
advance  of  these  pio- 
neers. When  a  heavy 
wheel  dropped  into  a 
deep  gully  or  earth- 
crack  or  ant-bear  hole, 
it  was  pried  out  with  un- 
tiring patience.  When 
thunder-storms  changed 
the  red  soil  to  beds  of 
mire  and  the  wheels  were  clogged  masses  of  mud  from  nave  to 
felloe,  the  mud  was  laboriously  scraped  away  and  the  wagons 
tugged  to  firmer  ground.  When  the  violent  wrenches  and  strains 
snapped  trektouws  and  wagon-poles  and  king-bolts  like  pack- 
thread, the  same  inflexible  temper  relinked  the  broken  touws  with 
riems  of  rawhide,  chopped  out  new  wagon-poles,  and  forged  new 
fastenings  with  rude  blacksmith's  art.  No  karroo  was  so  forbid- 
ding and  no  stream  so  swollen  as  to  bar  the  onward  march. 


Native  Laborers  in  War  Dress. 


102      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

The  tired  Boer  snored  serenely  at  night  behind  the  bulwark 
of  his  wagons,  regardless  of  the  wild  beasts  prowling  and  sniff- 
ing outside.  The  giggling  calls  of  the  gray  and  brown  jackals, 
the  doleful  howl  of  the  slinking  hyena,  even  the  deep  breathing 
sough  of  the  lurking  lion,  did  not  open  his  eyes,  and  it  must  be 
a  fiercely  menacing  roar  indeed  that  would  lift  his  head.  His 
only  haunting  dread  was  the  crippling  of  his  march  by  the 
deadly  tsetse  fly  or  the  wasting  diseases  that  made  his  horses 
and  oxen  the  prey  of  the  vulture. 


Trekbok  (Springbok)  Hunting. 

In  the  passage  of  these  pioneers  the  destruction  of  wild  ani- 
mals of  all  kinds  was  enormous,  partly  for  the  sake  of  needful 
food,  and  partly  for  the  skins,  but  much  wantonly  and  waste- 
fully,  for  the  Boer  would  rarely  let  pass  a  living  mark  for  his 
rifle.  Of  lesser  game  there  was  no  attempt  to  keep  tally,  but  by 
a  common  report  thousands  of  lions  were  shot  in  the  march  to 
the  Transvaal.  Any  such  reckoning  must  be  largely  guesswork, 
though  there  is  no  doubt  that  few  beasts  within  range  escaped  with- 
out the  sting  of  a  bullet.  But  a  foe  more  formidable  than  any 
multitude  of  lions  sought  to  bar  the  progress  of  the  Great  Trek. 

The  revolting  Umsilikazi  was  the  first  of  the  great  Zulu 
chiefs  to  try  the  temper  and  the  arms  of  these  pioneers.  One 


THE    PIONEER   ADVANCE 


103 


of  the  larger  divisions  of  the  Great  Trek,  led  by  Hendrik  Pot- 
gieter  and  Gert  Maritz,  left  the  Cape  Colony  in  August, 
1836,  and  pushed  north  of  the  Caledon  River.1  Some  of  the 
pioneers  in  this  advance  were  cut  off  suddenly  and  killed  by 
Umsilikazi.  Flushed  with  this  bloodshed,  he  made  a  swoop 
with  six  thousand  men  upon  a  part  of  Potgieter's  trek  —  a  com- 
pany of  a  few  score  men,  women,  and  children.  But  the  startled 
Boers  were  now  on  their 
guard.  They  ranged  their 
big,  white-tented  wagons  in  a 
square,  lashing  the  wheels  to- 
gether with  rawhide  riems, 
and  filling  in  the  chinks  in 
their  barricade  with  thorny 
mimosa  bushes.  In  the  cen- 
tre of  this  laager  a  few  wagons 
were  placed  as  a  cover  for  the 
women  and  children. 

Upon  sight  of  the  ad- 
vancing Matabele,  all  knelt 
and  prayed.  Then  some  of 
the  men  rode  out  boldly  to 
meet  the  attack  with  their 
heavy  rifles.  Their  fire  was 
deadly,  killing,  at  times,  two 
or  three  at  a  shot,  when  their 
guns  were  loaded  with  slugs, 
but  the  impis  pressed  on, 
driving  the  Boers  back  to  their  laager  in  a  sullen  retreat,  turning 
to  fire  as  fast  as  they  could  reload.  Within  the  laager  all  was 
made  ready  for  a  defence  to  the  death.  Back  of  every  wagon  a 
little  heap  of  powder  and  bullets  was  put  on  the  ground,  and  the 
women  stood  by  to  hand  spare  guns  and  reload.  It  was  sternly 
ordered  that  there  should  be  no  shrieking  or  crying  by  women 
or  children.  In  silence  the  rush  of  the  Matabele  was  awaited. 

1  The  Caledon  River  divides  Basutoland  from  the  Orange  River  Colony. 


Zulu  in  War  Dress. 


io4      THE   DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

On  came  the  impis  in  raging  masses  that  dashed  on  every 
side  of  the  laager  like  surf  on  a  reef,  wrenching  at  the  wheels, 
clambering  over  the  canvas,  plunging  through  the  thorns.  The 
heavy  wagons  were  shaken  and  swayed,  but  the  lashed  barricade 
held  fast.  The  grim  Boers  met  the  shock  with  withering 
volleys,  piling  up  the  blacks  in  bloody  heaps  around  the  laager. 
Crouching  behind  the  firing  line,  the  women  moulded  bullets 
and  helped  to  reload. 

The  firing  was  so  deadly  and  the  laager  so  impenetrable  that 
the  surges  massed  against  it  recoiled.  But,  after  a  moment  of 
rallying,on  came  the  billows  of  men,  flinging  their  assagais,  and 
howling  like  madmen  as  they  crashed  against  the  barrier  which 
shielded  the  Boers.  They  stabbed  and  slashed  at  the  canvas 
covers  in  frenzied  efforts  to  cut  their  way  over  the  wagons,  and 
wriggled  through  the  crevices  packed  with  thorn  bushes,  until 
some,  torn,  bloody,  and  gasping,  squirmed  into  the  square,  where 
the  Boer  women  killed  them  with  knives  and  hatchets.  The 
Boers  fired  as  fast  as  they  could  lift  their  rifles,  not  stopping  to 
use  their  ramrods,  but  grabbing  handfuls  of  powder  to  charge 
their  guns,  and  dropping  in  slugs  with  scarcely  any  wadding. 

So  intense  was  the  strain  of  that  hour  that  even  these  men 
of  iron  nerve  were  entranced.  "  Of  that  fight,"  wrote  one, 
"  nothing  remains  in  my  memory  except  shouting  and  tumult 
and  lamentation,  and  a  dense  smoke  that  rose  straight  as  a  plumb 
line  upwards  from  the  ground."  l 

Four  times  the  black  impis  charged  and  four  times  their 
onset  was  beaten  back  before  Umsilikazi  drew  off  his  men. 
The  field  around  the  laager  was  a  fearful  sight,  and  the  white 
tops  of  the  barricade  were  slashed  into  strips  and  dripping  with 
blood.  Seventy-two  stabs  were  counted  in  the  cover  of  one 
wagon,  and  eleven  hundred  and  seventy-two  assagais  were  flung 
through  into  the  camp.  But  none  of  the  stout  defenders  were 
killed,  and  all  joined  devoutly  in  a  psalm  of  thanksgiving. 

In  retaliation  for  this  attack  Hendrik  Potgieter  and  Pieter 
Uys  led  a  troop  of  one  hundred  and  thirty-seven  in  a  swift 

1  "Annals  of  Natal,"  p.  375. 


THE    PIONEER   ADVANCE 


105 


march  and  onslaught  upon  the  main  division  of  Umsilikazi. 
The  attack  was  so  well  timed  and  aimed  that  the  array  of  fierce 
impis  was  shattered  and  their  chief  was  driven  in  flight  to  the 
wilderness  beyond  the  Limpopo.  There,  in  the  present  Mata- 
beleland,  Umsilikazi  brought  together  the  remnants  of  his 
people,  and  ruled  in  awe  of  the  pioneers  until  his  death  in  1870. 

Hard  upon  the  defeat  of 
Umsilikazi  came  the  greater 
clash  with  Dingaan,  when  the 
trekking  Boers  crossed  the  Dra- 
kensberg  or  Dragon  Mountains 

O  O 

to  the  terraces  of  Natal.  This 
cunning  and  tricky  chief  made 
smooth  professions  of  friendship 
to  the  Boers  at  first.  He  wel- 
comed as  allies  the  company 
headed  by  Pieter  Retief  and  re- 
ceived the  commander  at  his 
kraal.  The  chief's  house  was  a 
spherical  hut  about  twenty  feet 
in  diameter.  Its  floor  was  pol- 

ished  till  it  shone  like  a  mirror,  and  its  roof  was  supported  by 
twenty-two  pillars  of  wood  completely  covered  with  beads. 
Around  this  house  were  seventeen  hundred  ruder  huts  which 
Dingaan  used  as  barracks  for  his  impis,  and  each  hut  would 
cover  twenty  men. 

After  some  parleying  Dingaan  signed  a  cession  of  the  greater 
part  of  the  present  territory  of  Natal  to  the  Boers.  To  cele- 
brate the  compact  he  invited  Retief  to  visit  him  again  with  his 
companions.  It  was  agreed  as  an  exhibit  of  good  faith  that  no 
arms  should  be  taken  into  the  chiefs  kraal.  So  Retief  and 
some  sixty  other  Boers,  with  forty  Hottentot  attendants,  piled 
their  arms  outside  the  kraal,  and  came  in  before  Dingaan,  who 
was  sitting  in  an  arm-chair  in  front  of  his  hut.  Two  of  his 
impis  were  formed  in  a  circle  about  him.  The  Boers  took  their 
seats  on  the  ground  within  the  circle,  and  cups  of  utywala  or 


io6      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

native  beer  were  offered  them  to  drink.  But  when  they  put 
their  lips  to  the  cup,  Dingaan  cried  out,  "  bulala  amatagati," 
"kill  the  wizards."  At  this  cry  his  Zulus  fell  on  their  helpless 
guests  in  overwhelming  mass.  A  few  Boers  had  clasp-knives, 
and  the  others  met  the  rush  with  naked  hands,  but  all  were 
overpowered  in  a  moment  and  dragged  over  the  ground  to  a 
hill  near  by,  called  Hloma  Mabuto,  or  the  mustering  of  the 
soldiers.  Here  their  heads  were  crushed  with  knob  kerries, 
and  their  bodies  were  flung  into  heaps.  Retief  was  forced  to  see 
the  horrid  murder  of  all  of  his  companions.  Then  his  heart 
and  liver  were  cut  out  and  taken  to  Dingaan,  and  the  mutilated 
corpse  was  cast  on  the  heap  of  dead.1 

None  of  the  Boers  in  the  trap  escaped,  and  after  the  mas- 
sacre the  Zulus  poured  out  to  raid  the  scattered  camps  of  the 
pioneers.  They  were  finally  beaten  back  at  Bushman's  River, 
after  they  had  killed  many  trekkers  and  carried  off  their  cattle, 
and  the  mounted  Boers  followed  their  retreat  for  days.  But 
the  Zulus  were  quick  to  turn  and  strike  again  like  fierce  hawks, 
and  within  two  months  they  swooped  down  upon  the  English 
settlers  and  native  blacks  of  Natal  and  cut  them  off  almost  to  a 
man. 

The  trekking  Boers  were  hard  pressed.  Pieter  Uys  was 
killed  in  ambuscade,  with  his  son,  a  boy  of  fourteen,  and  a  num- 
ber of  his  men.  When  Uys  was  fatally  wounded,  he  urged  his 
son  to  escape  by  spurring  his  horse,  and  the  boy  rode  on  to 
a  place  of  safety,  but  turned  and  rode  back  deliberately  to  die 
with  his  father.'2  Potgieter  drove  back  the  Zulus  after  the  fall 
of  Uys,  but  he  did  not  venture  to  hold  his  ground,  and  with- 
drew across  the  Drakensberg.  Only  a  determined  rally  and 
crushing  blow  could  free  Natal  from  the  hanging  menace  of  the 
impis  that  Chaka  had  trained  for  the  hand  of  Dingaan. 

In  December,  1838,  a  force  of  six  hundred  mounted  Boers 
was  mustered  to  strike  this  blow  under  the  command  of  Andries 
Pretorius.  It  seemed  an  absurdly  weak  force  for  such  an  attack, 
but  the  count  in  numbers  did  not  measure  its  strength.  Every 

1  "Annals  of  Natal,"  pp.  214-218.  2  Ibid.  p.  374. 


THE    PIONEER   ADVANCE  107 

man  was  a  master  marksman  with  the  heavy  rifle  that  had  so 
often  broken  the  bound  of  the  lion  and  stopped  the  charging 
rhinoceros  when  to  miss  was  death.  In  every  one's  heart  was 
a  flame  of  hate  for  the  ruthless  Zulu.  "  Remember  Retief " 
was  a  mutter  that  ran  from  man  to  man  as  the  troop  rode  on. 
They  longed  for  revenge  as  thirsty  men  crave  water.  They 
advanced,  too,  with  the  spirit  of  the  Israelites  of  old  and  of 
Cromwell's  Ironsides.  They  marched  only  between  matins 
and  evensong.  They  prayed  in  their  saddles  and  lifted  their 
voices  in  psalms.  Surely  the  God  of  their  covenant  had  the 
power  to  confound  any  might  of  the  heathen  and  deliver  their 
enemy  into  their  hands. 

When  they  drew  near  to  the  Zulus,  Pretorius  halted,  and 
with  all  his  men  offered  a  vow  to  the  God  of  their  fathers, 
should  He  grant  them  the  victory,  "to  raise  a  house  in  memory 
of  His  great  name  wherever  it  should  please  Him,  and  note  the 
day  in  a  book  to  make  it  known  to  latest  posterity." 

With  this  simple  confidence  in  Divine  protection  there  was 
the  shrewdest  practical  judgment  in  selecting  the  best  possible 
post  to  offset  their  comparative  weakness  in  numbers  and  in- 
trench their  little  force.  Their  laager  was  pitched  at  the  junc- 
tion of  a  broad  river  reach,  called  a  sea-cow  hole,  with  a  deep, 
dry  water-course,  covering  both  flanks.  Here,  on  Sunday,  the 
1 6th  of  December,  1838,  at  five  o'clock  in  the  morning,  they 
were  attacked  by  a  force  of  many  thousand  Zulus  and  fought 
for  more  than  five  hours.  Impi  after  impi,  reckless  of  life, 
charged  up  to  the  rifle  front  belching  smoke,  flame,  and  bullets, 
only  to  reel  back  before  the  deadly  hail.  When  even  this  rag- 
ing horde  wavered,  Pretorius  with  one  hundred  and  fifty  picked 
horsemen  circled  about  and  struck  their  rear  with  a  charge  so  fiery 
that  the  Zulus  were  utterly  routed.  The  Boers  drove  the  blacks 
to  the  river,  shooting  and  trampling  them  under  the  feet  of  their 
horses.  "  The  Kafirs  lay  on  the  ground,"  said  one  horseman, 
"  like  pumpkins  in  a  rich  soil  that  has  borne  a  large  crop."  The 
sea-cow  hole  was  packed  so  full  that  "  the  water  looked  like  a 

1  "Annals  of"  Natal,"  pp.  246-249,  448. 


io8       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


pool  of  blood,"  and  the  stream  thenceforward  was  known  as 
Blood  River.1  Three  thousand  six  hundred  Zulus  were  left 
dead  on  the  field,  and  this  decisive  victory  was  gained  without 
the  loss  of  a  single  life  to  the  Boers.  A  few  were  slightly 
wounded,  but  they  thought  nothing  of  their  hurts  in  the  com- 
mon thanksgiving. 

This  signal  triumph  and  salvation  were  humbly  taken  as  the 
answer  of  God  to  their  prayers,  and  the  vow  before  the  battle 

was  faithfully  ful- 
filled, as  the  old 
Dutch  Reformed 
Church  of  Pieter 
Maritzburg,  the 
mother  church 
of  Southeast  Af- 
rica, bears  wit- 
ness. The  flying 
Zulus  were  pur- 
sued and  the 
kraal  of  Dingaan 
captured,  Febru- 
ary 3d,  1839, 
where  the  bodies 
of  Retief  and 
his  companions 
were  found  and 
mournfully  buried  in  one  grave.  The  Boers  called  the  place 
Weenan,  the  weeping,  and  so  it  is  known  to  this  day. 

Dingaan  fled  north  and  hid  himself  in  a  concealed  kraal 
which  he  built.  A  Boer  writer  tells  a  story  of  his  capture  and 
death  with  grim  delight.  Many  of  the  tribes  which  had  been 
pressed  in  with  the  Zulus  made  peace  with  the  Boers.  One  of 
the  Swazi  chiefs,  Sapusa,  who  had  bowed  to  the  tyranny  of 
Dingaan,  found  his  late  master's  hiding-place.  "  On  the  first 
day  old  Sapusa  pricked  his  captive  with  sharp  assagais,  not 

1  "  Annals  of  Natal,"  pp.  246—249,  448. 


A  Zulu  Laborer  in  War  Attire. 


THE    PIONEER   ADVANCE  109 

more  than  skin  deep,  from  the  sole  of  his  foot  to  the  top  of  his 
head.  On  the  second  day  he  caused  him  to  be  bitten  by  dogs. 
On  the  third  day  Sapusa  said  to  Dingaan, '  Are  you  still  the  rain- 
maker, greatest  of  men  ?  The  sun  is  rising,  you  shall  not  see 
it  set.'  Then  he  took  assagais  and  bored  Dingaan's  eyes  out, 
and  when  the  sun  set,  Dingaan  died,  for  he  had  had  no  food  or 
water  for  three  days.  Such  was  the  end  of  Dingaan."  1 

So  the  Boers  finally  stayed  the  sweep  of  the  Zulu  scourge 
which  had  laid  waste  a  great  stretch  of  land  north  of  the  Cape 
settlements.  Upon  the  defeat  and  flight  of  Umsilikazi,  the  vic- 
torious commandant,  Hendrik  Potgieter,  proclaimed  that  all  the 
territory  overrun  by  this  chief  was  forfeited  to  the  pioneer 
Boers.  This  claim  covered  the  greater  part  of  the  late  South 
African  Republic,  and  half,  at  least,  of  what  is  now  the  Orange 
River  Colony.  In  this  assertion  there  was  no  recognition  of 
any  sovereignty  of  Great  Britain  or  attachment  to  the  Cape 
Colony.  It  was  the  view  of  the  Boers  that  the  land  which  they 
took  was  theirs  by  right  of  capture  and  forfeit,  and  that  they 
were  independent  adventurers  with  no  ties  of  allegiance.  A 
simple  form  of  republican  government  was  established  for  the 
Boers,  north  of  the  Orange  River,  by  a  general  assembly  of  the 
pioneers  at  Winburg  in  June,  1837,  and  a  few  years  later,  on 
the  land  won  from  Dingaan,  on  the  other  side  of  the  Drakens- 
berg,  the  republic  of  Natalia  was  declared  to  extend  from  the 
Umzimbulu  to  the  Tugela.  Outside  of  these  crudely  organized 
political  associations  there  were  from  sixteen  to  twenty  pioneer 
companies,  headed  by  field  cornets,  which  were  practically  as 
independent  as  the  native  tribes  north  of  the  Drakensberg. 
Neither  of  the  republican  creations  was  recognized  by  Great 
Britain,  and,  in  1842,  Port  Natal  and  the  seaboard  of  the 
republic  were  captured,  though  Andries  Pretorius  repulsed  the 
first  British  attack  at  Congella  with  heavy  loss.  In  the  follow- 
ing year  Natal  was  formally  declared  to  be  a  British  Colony,  and 
several  thousand  British  immigrants  were  brought  in  to  take  the 

1  Of  the  basic  fact  of  the  assassination  of  Dingaan  by  a  Swazi  there  is  no 
question. 


no      THE    DIAMOND    MINES   OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

place  of  the  retiring  Boers  who  recrossed  the  Drakensberg.  In 
1848,  by  proclamation  of  Sir  Harry  Smith,  her  Majesty's  High 
Commissioner  and  Governor  of  Cape  Colony,  all  the  territory 
between  the  Vaal  and  Orange  rivers  and  the  Quathlamba  divi- 
sion of  the  Drakensberg  was  formally  declared  to  be  part  of  the 
British  dominions  under  the  name  of  the  Orange  River  Sover- 
eignty. The  Boers  had  been  spreading  out  towards  the  Vaal  in 
many  trekking  parties  north  of  the  Drakensberg,  and  the  Brit- 
ish supremacy  was  not  recognized  until  it  was  forcibly  asserted 
by  arms  in  the  battle  of  Boomplatz,  July  22,  1848.  Then  part 
of  the  Boers  sullenly  submitted,  but  many,  headed  by  Andries 
Pretorius,  preferred  to  pass  beyond  the  farthest  assertion  of 
English  dominion  by  crossing  the  Vaal  and  entering  the  wilder- 
ness stretching  to  the  Limpopo. 

There  was  then  not  even  a  glimmer  of  anticipation  that  the 
great  stretch  of  veld  and  karroo  between  the  Orange  and  the  Vaal 
contained  by  far  the  richest  diamond  fields  in  the  world.  The 
controlling  ministry  in  Great  Britain  at  the  time  did  not  even 
consider  it  worth  the  cost  of  keeping  and  defending,  and  on 
October  21,  1851,  Earl  Grey  wrote  to  Sir  Harry  Smith  that 
"  its  ultimate  abandonment  should  be  a  settled  point  in  imperial 
policy."  The  territory  beyond  the  Vaal  was  rated  still  more 
cheaply,  and  on  January  17,  1852,  the  local  independence  of 
the  inhabitants  of  the  Transvaal  was  formally  recognized  by  the 
Sand  River  Convention,  signed  by  two  assistant  commissioners 
for  Sir  Harry  Smith,  and  by  appointed  delegates  for  the  Trans- 
vaal pioneers.  The  state  organization  of  these  settlers  was  first 
christened  Hollandsche  Afrikaansche  Republiek,  but  this  name 
was  changed  to  Zud  Afrikaansche  Republiek  in  September, 
1853.  In  the  preceding  month  of  July,  Andries  Pretorius,  the 
pioneer  leader  who  broke  the  Zulu  power,  died,  but  his  great 
service  was  honorably  recognized  in  the  choice  of  his  eldest  son, 
Marthinus  Wessels  Pretorius,  as  the  first  president  of  the  new 
Republic,  and  in  the  establishment  of  its  capital  of  Pretoria. 

On  March  31,  1852,  Lieutenant  General  George  Cathcart  suc- 
ceeded Sir  Harry  Smith  as  High  Commissioner  and  Governor 


THE    PIONEER   ADVANCE  in 

of  Cape  Colony.  The  Transvaal  had  been  already  disposed  of 
by  the  Sand  River  Convention,  but,  immediately  after  his  arrival, 
May  13,  1852,  General  Cathcart  issued  a  formal  proclamation 
confirming  this  convention.  It  appeared,  too,  that  it  might  be 
desirable  to  shift  the  charge  of  maintenance  and  local  defence  of 
the  Orange  River  Sovereignty  to  the  shoulders  of  the  pioneer 
settlers.  This  conviction  was  confirmed  by  the  outbreak  of  a 
war  with  the  Basutos,  the  most  powerful  native  tribe  in  this  terri- 
tory, under  a  cunning  chief,  Moshesh.  In  November,  1852,  Gen- 
eral Cathcart  led  a  little  army  of  two  thousand  infantry  and  five 
hundred  cavalry  to  the  Caledon  River,  but  in  the  following  month 
his  expedition  was  beset  by  an  overwhelming  force  of  Basutos 
at  Berea  Mountain,  and  the  battle  was  in  effect  a  repulse  to 
the  British.  After  leaving  a  garrison  at  Bloemfontein,  General 
Cathcart  withdrew  under  cover  of  a  fragile  proclamation  of 
peace,  but  his  report  and  the  accompanying  news  were  so  dis- 
couraging that  the  Duke  of  Newcastle  wrote  to  him  that  "  her 
Majesty's  Government  had  decided  to  withdraw  from  the 
Orange  River  Sovereignty."  In  pursuance  of  this  conclusion 
a  convention  was  signed  February  23,  1854,  at  Bloemfontein,  by 
Sir  George  Russell  Clerk,  special  commissioner  representing 
Great  Britain,  and  by  the  delegates  from  districts  in  the  sov- 
ereignty. By  this  convention  the  independence  of  the  settlers 
in  the  sovereignty  was  guaranteed,  and  the  administration  was 
handed  over  to  a  provisional  council,  which  took  charge  until 
the  first  sitting  of  the  Volksraad,  March  28,  1854,  and  the 
declaration  of  a  republic  in  the  following  month  under  the  name 
of  the  Orange  Free  State.  This  independent  state  covered  the 
greater  part  of  the  territory  comprised  within  the  bounds  of  the 
Orange  River  Sovereignty,  excepting  the  large  division  between 
the  Caledon  River  and  the  Quathlamba  Mountains,  reserved 
to  the  Basutos,  and  smaller  reservations  on  the  Vaal  held  by 
the  Griquas. 

Within  the  limits  of  the  whole  district  between  the  Orange 
and  the  Vaal  rivers  there  were  then  not  more  than  fifteen  thou- 
sand whites  scattered  over  a  territory  of  many  thousand  square 


ii2      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

miles.  Except  in  the  Caledon  River  districts  little  of  this  great 
expanse  was  capable  of  supporting  any  clustered  population  or 
even  available  for  agriculture.  The  soil  throughout  was  shallow, 
and  in  the  southern  and  western  sections  the  rainfall  was  ordi- 
narily light.  There  were  a  number  of  widespreading  karroos,  and 
in  the  dry  months  the  greater  part  of  the  veld  was  little  better 
than  the  desert.  The  so-called  farms  were  chiefly  cattle  and  sheep 
pastures,  where  the  yield  of  grass  and  herbage  was  so  varying 
that  several  thousand  acres  were  needed  for  any  fair  assurance  of 


Birds'  Nest  of  Social  Grosbeak. 

safety  for  a  small  herd.  The  total  number  of  farms  secured  by 
grant  was  only  twelve  hundred  and  sixty-five,  but  they  extended 
over  eleven  million  acres.  Of  the  farm  owners  only  one  hundred 
and  thirty-nine  were  Englishmen,  and  a  number  of  these  were  non- 
residents.1 In  the  abstract  there  was  seemingly  little  attraction  or 
value  to  excite  any  flow  of  immigration  or  to  make  the  province 
a  prize  worth  the  cost  of  defending. 

Not  only  the  prospects  of  the  Orange  Free  State  and  of  its 
neighbor  on  the  other  side  of  the  Vaal  seemed  dull  and  incon- 
siderable to  most  observers,  but  the  condition  of  Natal  and 

i  "  South  Africa,"  Theal. 


Elephant. 


Zebra. 


*y 


Antelope. 


Rhinoceros. 


Haartebeesle  and  Gemsbok. 


Giraffe.  Rhinoceros. 

Native  Carvings  on  Boulders  at  Klipfontein,  35  Miles  West  of  Kimberley. 


• 


ERSITY   j 

CF 


THE    PIONEER   ADVANCE  113 

of  Cape  Colony  itself  was  little  more  promising.  In  Great 
Britain  the  whole  dependency  was  so  lightly  esteemed  that  it 
was  determined  in  1849  to  utilize  it  as  a  dumping  ground  for 
convicts,  after  Australia  had  resentfully  thrown  off  this  burden. 
The  convict  ship  Neptune  was  actually  sent  out,  but  the  indigna- 
tion of  the  colonists  was  so  demonstrative  that  no  convicts  were 
landed,  and  the  ship  with  its  load  was  held  for  five  months  in 
Simon's  Bay,  the  present  Naval  Station,  a  little  south  of  Cape 
Town,  until  the  recalling  order  was  received,  February  13,  1850. 
The  colony  had  not  sunk  so  low  as  to  submit  to  this  mark  of 
contempt,  but  it  was  undoubtedly  drooping  in  hopes  and  enter- 
prise, and  the  progress  of  its  industrial  development  was  pain- 
fully slow.  There  had  been  a  pronounced  diversion  from 
agriculture  to  cattle  and  sheep  raising  for  reasons  before  noted, 
and  wool  had  become  the  chief  and  almost  the  only  export  of 
consequence.  Still  the  peculiar  condition  and  vagaries  of  the 
South  African  climate  and  seasons  were  hard  to  provide  for  or 
overcome,  and  there  were  prevalent  diseases  that  attacked  horses, 
cattle,  and  sheep,  and  greatly  checked  the  rise  of  the  pastoral 
industry.  Communication  from  one  part  of  the  colony  to 
another  was  very  slowly  improved.  The  roads  were  few  and 
bad,  and  in  1867  the  only  stretch  of  railway  in  all  South  Africa 
was  a  bare  forty  miles  from  Cape  Town  to  Wellington.  The 
total  annual  export  of  the  Colony  was  a  trifle  over  ^2,000,000 
in  value,  and  there  was  no  diversification  of  industries  and  no 
manufactures  of  any  considerable  extent.1  This  was  the  situation 
when  the  gloom  was  suddenly  dispelled  and  the  whole  face  of 
South  Africa  changed  by  the  discovery  of  the  Diamond  Fields. 

1  "South  Africa,"  Theal. 


MOSHESH,  A    NOTED    CHIEF   OF   THE    BASUTO   TRIBE  WHO    FOUGHT 
THE   ENGLISH.     (See  page  HI.) 


THE    DISCOVERY 


EARLY  two  hundred  years  had  passed  since 
the  memorable  expedition  of  van  der  Stel 
made  known  to  geographers  the  Groote  River, 
which,  a  hundred  years  later,  was  christened 
the  Orange.  Before  Great  Britain  took  the 
Cape,  the  daring  van  Reenen  had  penetrated 
to  Modder  Fontein,  unconsciously  skirting  the  rim  of  a  marvel- 
lous diamond  field.  Since  the  beginning  of  the  century  scores 
of  roving  hunters  had  chased  their  game  over  a  network  of 
devious  tracks,  traversing  every  nook  of  the  land  between  the 
Orange  and  the  Vaal,  and  often  camping  for  days  upon  their 
banks.  Then  the  trekking  pioneer  graziers  and  farmers  plodded 
on  after  the  hunters,  sprinkling  their  huts  and  kraals  over  the 
face  of  the  Orange  Free  State,  but  naturally  squatting  first  on 
the  arable  lands  and  grazing  ground  nearest  the  water-courses. 
So,  in  the  course  of  years,  in  the  passage  of  the  Great  Trek, 
thousands  of  men,  women,  and  children  had  passed  across  the 
Orange  and  Vaal,  and  up  and  down  their  winding  valleys,  and 
hundreds,  at  least,  had  trodden  the  river  shore  sands  of  the 
region  in  which  the  most  precious  of  gems  were  lying. 

On  the  Orange  River,  some  thirty  miles  above  its  junction 
with  the  Vaal,  there  was  the  hamlet  of  Hopetown,  one  of  the 
most  thriving  of  the  little  settlements,  and  a  number  of  farms 
dotted  the  angle  between  the  rivers.  Along  the  line  of  the  Vaal, 
for  some  distance  above  its  entry  into  the  Orange,  there  were 
some  ill-defined  reservations  occupied  by  a  few  weak  native 
tribes,  —  Koranas  and  Griquas,  —  for  whose  instruction  there 

114 


THE    DISCOVERY  115 

were  mission  stations  at  Pniel  and  Hebron.1  For  centuries 
unnumbered  the  aboriginal  tribes  had  been  ignorantly  trampling 
under  foot  gems  of  countless  price,  and  for  years  Dutch  and 
English  hunters,  pioneers,  farmers,  shepherds,  and  missionaries 
trekked  as  heedlessly  over  the  African  diamond  beds. 

After  the  revelation  of  this  fact,  there  arose,  it  is  true,  an 
imposing  tale  of  an  old  mission  map  of  the  Orange  River  region, 
drawn  as  far  back  as  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century,  across 
whose  worn  and  soiled  face  was  scrawled:  "Here  be  diamonds."  2 
Even  if  this  report  were  true,  there  was  no  evidence  determining 
the  date  of  the  scrawl,  which  might  more  credibly  be  a  crude 
new  record  than  a  vague  old  one.  In  any  event,  it  does  not 
appear  that  there  was  even  a  floating  rumor  of  the  probable 
existence  of  a  South  African  diamond  field  at  the  time  of  the 
actual  discovery  of  the  first  identified  gem. 

There  is  nothing  surprising  in  this  oversight.  When  a 
spectator  beholds  a  great  semicircle  of  artfully  cut  gems  spar- 
kling on  the  heads,  necks,  and  hands  of  fair  women  massed  in 
superb  array,  and  resplendent  in  the  brilliant  lights  of  an  opera 
house,  or  when  one  views  the  moving  throng  glittering  with 
jewels  in  grand  court  assemblies,  it  is  hard  for  him  to  realize 
how  inconspicuous  a  tiny  isolated  crystal  may  be  in  the  richest 
of  earth  beds.  No  spot  in  a  diamond  field  has  the  faintest 
resemblance  to  a  jeweller's  show  tray.  Here  is  no  display  of 
gems  blazing  like  a  Mogul's  throne,  or  a  Queen's  tiara,  or  the 
studded  cloak  of  a  Russian  noble.  Only  in  the  marvellous 
valley  of  Sindbad  are  diamonds  strewn  on  the  ground  in  such 
profusion  that  they  are  likely  to  stick  in  the  toes  of  a  barefooted 
traveller,  and  can  be  gathered  by  flinging  carcasses  of  sheep  from 
surrounding  precipices  to  tempt  eagles  to  serve  as  diamond 
winners. 

It  needs  no  strain  of  faith  to  credit  the  old  Persian  tale  of 
the  discontented  Ali  Hafed,  roaming  far  and  wide  from  his 

1  "South  Africa,"  George  McCall  Theal,  London,  1888,  1891,  1893. 

2  "  South  African  Diamond  Fields  and  Journey    to   Mines,"    William    Jacob 
Morton,   New  York,    1877. 


n6      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

charming  home  on  the  banks  of  the  Indus  in  search  of  dia- 
monds, and,  finally,  beggared  and  starving,  casting  himself  into 
the  river  which  flowed  by  his  house,  while  the  diamonds  of  Gol- 
conda  were  lying  in  his  own  garden  sands.  It  is  probable  that 
the  diamonds  of  India  were  trodden  under  foot  for  thousands  of 
years  before  the  first  precious  stone  of  the  Deccan  was  stuck  in 
an  idol's  eye  or  a  rajah's  turban.  It  is  known  that  the  Brazilian 
diamond  fields  were  washed  for  many  years  by  gold  placer 
diggers  without  any  revelation  of  diamonds  to  the  world, 
although  these  precious  stones  were  often  picked  up  and  so 
familiarly  handled  that  they  were  used  by  the  black  slaves  in  the 
fields  as  counters  in  card  games. 

If  this  be  true  of  the  most  famous  and  prolific  of  all  dia- 
mond fields  before  the  opening  of  the  South  African  placers  and 
mines,  any  delay  in  the  revelation  of  the  field  in  the  heart  of 
South  Africa  may  be  easily  understood.  For  it  was  not  only 
necessary  to  have  eyes  bright  and  keen  enough  to  mark  one  of 
the  few  tiny  precious  crystals  which  were  lying  on  the  face  of 
vast  stretches  of  pebbles,  boulders,  and  sand,  but  the  observer 
must  prize  such  a  crystal  enough  to  stoop  to  pick  it  up  if  it  lay 
plainly  before  his  eyes.  To  the  naked  native  a  rough  diamond 
had  no  more  attraction  than  any  other  pretty  pebble.  There 
were  millions  of  other  white  crystals  and  many  colored  pebbles 
on  the  river  shores  which  were  equally  precious  or  worthless  in 
his  eyes.  The  roving  hunters  were  looking  sharply  for  game 
bounding  over  the  veld,  and  only  glanced  at  a  pebble-strewn 
bank  to  mark  the  possible  track  of  their  prey.  The  stolid  Boer 
pioneers  would  hardly  bend  their  backs  to  pick  up  the  prettiest 
stone  that  ever  lay  on  the  bank  of  an  African  river,  even  if  it 
were  as  big  as  the  great  yellow  diamond  so  jealously  guarded  by 
the  Portuguese  crown.1 

It  might  be  thought  that  some  visitor  to  the  fields  would  be 
more  expert  in  judging  its  character  than  natives,  hunters,  and 
farmers ;  but  there  were  few  trained  mineralogists  in  South 

1  "The  Gold  Regions  of  Southeastern  Africa,"  Thomas  Baines,  F.R.G.S., 
London,  1877. 


THE    DISCOVERY  117 

Africa,  and  it  is  doubtful  if  there  was  one  who  had  ever  examined 
a  diamond  field  personally  or  compared  one  field  with  another. 
Even  with  this  special  experience  an  expert  student  of  general 
mineral  formations  might  survey  this  particular  field  closely  with- 
out suspecting  the  existence  of  diamonds.  This  was  demon- 
strated in  the  visit  of  the  colonial  geologist  Wyley  to  the 
Orange  Free  State  in  1856,  when  he  investigated  the  alleged 
discovery  of  gold  in  thin  veins  of  quartz  lining  the  joints  and 
crevices  of  the  trappean  rocks  at  Smithfield.  In  the  course  of 
his  exploration  he  went  to  Fauresmith,  where  diamonds  were 
afterward  picked  from  the  town  commonage,  and  stood  on  the 
verge  of  the  farm  Jagersfontein,  later  the  seat  of  a  prolific  dia- 
mond mine,  yet  it  does  not  appear  that  he  had  even  a  surmise 
of  the  existence  of  diamonds  in  the  field  of  his  investiga- 
tion.1 It  is  but  fair  to  him  to  observe,  however,  that  the  sec- 
tion which  he  visited  had  no  such  close  resemblance  to  any 
known  typical  field  as  that  which  led  Humboldt  and  Rose  to 
the  revelation  of  the  diamonds  of  the  Ural  from  the  similarity 
of  the  ground  formations  to  those  of  the  Brazilian  diamond 
districts. 

As  a  matter  of  fact  nobody  who  entered  the  Vaal  river  region 
conceived  it  to  be  a  possible  diamond  field  or  thought  of  search- 
ing for  any  precious  stones.  Probably,  too,  there  was  not  a 
person  in  the  Orange  Free  State,  and  few  in  the  Cape  Colony, 
who  was  able  to  distinguish  a  rough  diamond  if  he  found  one  by 
chance,  or  would  be  likely  to  prize  such  a  crystal.  For  the  dis- 
covery of  diamonds  under  such  conditions  it  was  practically 
necessary  that  a  number  of  prospectors  should  enter  it  who 
would  search  the  gravel  beds  often  and  eagerly  for  the  prettiest 
pebbles.  Were  any  such  collectors  at  work  in  the  field? 

One  of  the  trekking  Boers,  Daniel  Jacobs,  had  made  his 
home  on  the  banks  of  the  Orange  River  near  the  little  settle- 
ment of  Hopetown.  He  was  one  of  the  sprinkling  of  little 
farmers  who  was  stolidly  content  with  a  bare  and  precarious  liv- 

1  "Among  the  Diamonds,"  by  the  late  John  Noble,  Clerk  of  the  House  of 
Assembly,  Cape  Town. 


n8       THE    DIAMOND    MINES   OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

ing  on  the  uncertain  pasture  lands  of  the  veld.  Here  his  chil- 
dren grew  up  about  him  with  little  more  care  than  the  goats  that 
browsed  on  the  kopjes. 

A  poor  farmer's  home  was  a  squalid  hovel.  It  was  roughly 
partitioned  to  form  a  bedroom  and  kitchen,  lighted  by  two  small 
windows  smudged  with  grime.  Dirty  calico  tacked  on  the 
rafters  made  its  ceiling.  Its  bare  earthen  floor  was  smeared 
weekly  with  a  polishing  paste  of  cowdung  and  water.  Father, 
mother,  and  children  slept  together  on  a  rude  frame  overlaced 
with  rawhide  strips.  The  only  other  furniture  in  this  stifling 
bedroom  was  a  chest  of  drawers  and  a  small  cracked  mirror. 
There  was  no  washbowl  or  water  pitcher,  but  in  the  morning 
one  after  another  of  the  family  wiped  their  faces  and  swabbed 
their  hands  on  the  same  moistened  cloth.  Then  they  drew  up 
chairs  with  rawhide  seats  to  a  rough  wooden  table  and  ate  corn 
meal  porridge,  and  sometimes  a  hunk  of  tough  mutton  boiled 
with  rice,  and  soaked  their  coarse  unbolted  wheat  flour  bread  in 
a  gritty,  black  coffee  syrup.1 

When  the  sheep  and  goats  were  turned  out  of  the  kraal  to 
graze  on  the  patches  of  grass  and  the  stunted  thorns  of  the  veld, 
the  children  ran  away  after  them  and  roamed  over  the  pasture 
land  all  day  long  like  the  flocks.  There  was  no  daily  round  of 
work  for  them.  The  black  servants  were  the  shepherds  of  the 
flocks,  and  did  the  slovenly  housework,  under  the  indolent  eye 
of  the  Boer  and  his  vrouw,  for  the  poorest  farmer  would  not 
work  with  his  own  hands  except  at  a  pinch.  His  boys  and  girls 
had  never  seen  a  doll  or  a  toy  of  any  kind,  but  the  instinct  of 
childhood  will  find  playthings  on  the  face  of  the  most  barren 
karroo,  and  the  Jacobs  children  were  luckily  close  to  the  edge  of 
a  river  which  was  strewn  with  uncommonly  beautiful  pebbles, 
mixed  with  coarser  gravel. 

Here  were  garnets  with  their  rich  carmine  flush,  the  fainter 
rose  of  the  carnelian,  the  bronze  of  jasper,  the  thick  cream  of 
chalcedony,  heaps  of  agates  of  motley  hues,  and  many  shining 

1  "  Life  with  the  Boers  in  the  Orange  Free  State,"  by  a  resident  English  physi- 
cian's wife,  New  York,  1899. 


THE    DISCOVERY  119 

rock  crystals.1  From  this  party-colored  bed  the  children  picked 
whatever  caught  their  eye  and  fancy,  and  rilled  their  pockets  with 
their  chosen  pebbles.  So  a  poor  farmer's  child  found  playthings 
scattered  on  a  river  bank  which  a  little  prince  might  covet,  and 
the  boy  might  have  skimmed  the  face  of  the  river  with  one  little 
white  stone  that  was  worth  more  than  his  father's  farm.  Fortu- 
nately for  the  future  of  South  Africa,  he  did  not  play  ducks  and 
drakes  with  this  particular  stone,  which  he  found  one  day  in  the 
early  spring  of  1867,  but  carried  it  home  in  his  pocket  and 
dropped  it  with  a  handful  of  other  pebbles  on  the  farmhouse 
floor.2 

A  heap  of  these  party-colored  stones  was  so  common  a  sight 
in  the  yard  or  on  the  floor  of  a  farmhouse  on  the  banks  of  the 
Orange  and  Vaal,  that  none  of  the  plodding  Boers  gave  it  a 
second  glance.  But  when  the  children  tossed  the  stones  about, 
the  little  white  pebble  was  so  sparkling  in  the  sunlight  that  it 
caught  the  eye  of  the  farmer's  wife.  She  did  not  care  enough 
for  it  to  pick  it  up,  but  spoke  of  it  as  a  curious  stone  to  a  neigh- 
bor, Schalk  van  Niekerk.  Van  Niekerk  asked  to  see  it,  but  it 
was  not  in  the  heap.  One  of  the  children  had  rolled  it  away  in 
the  yard.  After  some  little  search  it  was  found  in  the  dust,  for 
nobody  on  the  farm  would  stoop  for  such  a  trifle. 

When  van  Niekerk  wiped  off  the  dust,  the  little  stone  glit- 
tered so  prettily  that  he  offered  to  buy  it.  The  good  vrouw 
laughed  at  the  idea  of  selling  a  pebble.  "  You  can  keep  the 
stone,  if  you  want  it,"  she  said.  So  van  Niekerk  put  it  in  his 
pocket  and  carried  it  home.  He  had  only  a  vague  notion  that 
it  might  have  some  value,  and  put  it  in  the  hands  of  a  travelling 
trader,  John  O'Reilly,  who  undertook  to  find  out  what  kind  of 
a  stone  the  little  crystal  was,  and  whether  it  could  be  sold.  He 

1  "The  Diamond  Diggings    of  South  Africa,"  Charles  Alfred  Payton,   Lon- 
don, 1872.        "South    Africa    Diamond    Fields,"    Morton,    New    York,     1877. 
"Diamonds  and  Gold  of  South  Africa,"  Henry  Mitchell  of  Kimberley,   London, 
1889. 

2  "Among  the  Diamonds,"   1870-1871.      "South  Africa,"  Theal,  London, 
1888-1893. 


120       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


showed  the  stone  to  several  Jews  in  Hopetown  and  in  Coles- 
berg,  a  settlement  farther  up  the  Orange  River  Valley.  No 
one  of  these  would  give  a  penny  for  it.  "  It  is  a  pretty  stone 
enough,"  they  said,  "probably  a  topaz,  but  nobody  would  pay 
anything  for  it." 

Perhaps  O'Reilly  would  have  thrown  the  pebble  away,  if  it 
had  not  come  under  the  eye  of  the  acting  Civil  Commissioner 
at  Colesberg,  Mr.  Lorenzo  Boyes.  Mr.  Boyes  found  on  trial 
that  the  stone  would  scratch  glass. 

"  I  believe  it  to  be  a  diamond,"  he  observed  gravely.1 
O'Reilly  was  greatly  cheered  up.     "You  are  the  only  man 

I  have  seen,"  he  said,  "  who 
says  it  is  worth  anything. 
Whatever  it  is  worth  you 
shall  have  a  share  in  it." 

"  Nonsense,"    broke    in 
Dr.  Kirsh,  a  private  apothe- 
cary  of  the  town,  who  was 
present,  "  I'll  bet    Boyes    a 
new  hat  it  is  only  a  topaz." 
"  I'll  take   the  bet,"    re- 
plied Mr.  Boyes,  and  at  his 
suggestion    the     stone     was 
sent  for  determination  to  the 
John  O'Reilly.  foremost  mineralogist  of  the 

colony,  Dr.  W.  Guybon  Atherstone,  residing  at  Grahamstown. 
It  was  so  lightly  valued  that  it  was  put  in  an  unsealed  envelope 
and  carried  to  Grahamstown  in  the  regular  post-cart. 

When  the  post-boy  handed  the  letter  to  Dr.  Atherstone, 
the  little  river  stone  fell  out  and  rolled  away.  The  doctor 
picked  it  up  and  read  the  letter  of  transmission.2  Then  he 
examined  the  pebble  expertly  and  wrote  to  Mr.  Boyes :  "  I 
congratulate  you  on  the  stone  you  have  sent  to  me.  It  is  a 

1  Lorenzo  Boyes  (statement  furnished  to  author),   1899. 

2  W.  Guybon  Atherstone  ;  Lorenzo  Boyes,  1899.      "  Among  the  Diamonds," 
1870-1871. 


THE    DISCOVERY 


121 


veritable  diamond,  weighs  twenty-one  and  a  quarter  carats,  and 
is  worth  ^500.  It  has  spoiled  all  the  jewellers'  files  in  Grahams- 
town,  and  where  that  came  from  there 
must  be  lots  more.  Can  I  send  it  to 
Mr.  Southey,  Colonial  Secretary  ?  " 

This  report  was  a  revelation  which 
transformed  the  despised  Karrooland  as 
the  grimy  Cinderella  was  transfigured 
by  the  wand  of  her  fairy  godmother. 
The  determination  was  so  positive  and 
the  expertness  of  the  examiner  so  well 
conceded  that  Sir  Philip  Wodehouse, 
the  Governor  at  the  Cape,  bought  the  Mr-  Lorenzo  Boyes< 

rough  diamond  at  once,  at  the  value  fixed  by  Dr.  Atherstone  and 
confirmed  by  the  judgment  of  M.  Henriette,  the  French  consul 
in  Cape  Town.1  The  stone  was  sent  immediately  to  the  Paris 
Exhibition,  where  it  was  viewed  with  much  interest,  but  its  dis- 
covery, at  first,  did  not  cause  any  great  sensation.  The  occa- 
sional finding  of  a  diamond  in  a  bed  of  pebbles  had  been 
reported  before  from  various  parts  of  the  globe,  and  there  was 

no  assurance  in  this  discovery  of  any 
considerable  diamond  deposits. 

Meanwhile  Mr.  Boyes  hastened 
to  Hopetown  and  to  van  Niekerk's 
farm,  to  search  along  the  river  shore 
where  the  first  diamond  was  found. 
He  prodded  the  phlegmatic  farmers 
and  their  black  servants,  raked  over 
many  bushels  of  pebbles  for  two 
weeks,  but  no  second  diamond  repaid 
his  labor.  Still  the  news  of  the  find- 
Dr.  w.  Guybon  Atherstone.  ing  of  the  first  stone  made  the  farmers 

near  the  river  look  more  sharply  at  every  heap  of  pebbles  in  the 
hope  of  finding  one  of  the  precious  "  blink  klippe  "  (bright  stones), 

1  "South  Africa,"  Theal.      Lorenzo  Boyes,  1899.       "Diamonds  and  Geld 
of  South  Africa,"  Theodore  Reunert,    1893. 


122       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

as  the  Boers  named  the  diamond,  and  many  bits  of  shining  rock 
crystal  were  carefully  pocketed,  in  the  persuasion  that  the  glit- 
tering stones  were  diamonds.  But  it  was  ten  months  from  the 
time  of  the  discovery  at  Hopetown  before  a  second  diamond 
was  found,  and  this  was  in  a  spot  more  than  thirty  miles  away, 
on  the  river  bank  below  the  junction  of  the  Vaal  and  Orange 
rivers.  Mr.  Boyes  again  hastened  to  the  place  from  which  the 
diamond  had  been  taken,  but  he  failed  again  to  find  companion 
stones,  though  he  reached  the  conclusion  that  the  diamond  had 
been  washed  down  stream  by  the  overflowing  of  the  Vaal.1 

From  the  Orange  River  the  search  passed  up  the  Vaal,  where 
the  beds  of  pebbles  were  still  more  common  and  beautiful.  The 
eyes  of  the  native  blacks  were  much  quicker  and  keener  in 
such  a  quest  than  those  of  the  stolid  Boer,  who  scarcely  troubled 
himself  to  stoop  for  the  faint  chance  of  a  diamond.  But  no 
steady  or  systematic  search  was  undertaken  by  anybody,  and  it 
was  not  until  the  next  year,  1868,  that  a  few  more  diamonds  were 
picked  up  on  the  banks  of  the  Vaal  by  some  sharp-sighted 
Koranas.'2  The  advance  of  discovery  was  so  slow  and  disap- 
pointing that  there  seemed  only  a  faint  prospect  of  the  realization 
of  the  cheering  prediction  of  Dr.  Atherstone,  which  was  scouted 
by  critics  who  were  wholly  incompetent  to  pass  upon  it.  Even 
the  possibility  of  the  existence  of  diamond  deposits  near  the 
junction  of  the  Orange  and  Vaal  was  flatly  denied  by  a  preten- 
tious examiner  who  came  from  England  to  report  on  the  Hope- 
town  field.  It  was  gravely  asserted  that  any  diamonds  in  that 
field  must  have  been  carried  in  the  gizzards  of  ostriches  from 
some  far-distant  region,  and  any  promotion  of  search  in  the 
field  was  a  bubble  scheme. 

To  this  absurd  and  taunting  report  Dr.  Atherstone  replied 
with  marked  force  and  dignity,  presenting  the  facts  indicating 
the  existence  of  diamond-bearing,  deposits,  and  adding:  "Suf- 
ficient has  been  already  discovered  to  justify  a  thorough  and 
extensive  geological  research  into  this  most  interesting  country, 
and  I  think  for  the  interest  of  science  and  the  benefit  of  the 

1  Lorenzo  Boyes,   1899.         2  "  South  Africa,"  Theal,  London,  1888-1893. 


THE    DISCOVERY  123 

Colony  a  scientific  examination  of  the  country  will  be  under- 
taken. So  far  from  the  geological  character  of  the  country  mak- 
ing it  impossible,  I  maintain  that  it  renders  it  probable  that  very 
extensive  and  rich  diamond  deposits  will  be  discovered  on  proper 
investigation.  This  I  trust  the  Home  Government  will  author- 
ize, as  our  Colonial  exchequer  is  too  poor  to  admit  of  it."1 

There  was  no  official  response  to  this  well-warranted  sug- 
gestion, for  it  had  hardly  been  penned  when  the  announcement 
of  a  remarkable  discovery  aroused  such  an  excitement  and  such 
a  rush  to  the  field  that  no  government  exploration  was  needed. 
In  March,  1869,  a  superb  white  diamond,  weighing  83.5  carats, 
was  picked  up  by  a  Griqua  shepherd  boy  on  the  farm  Zendfon- 
tein,  near  the  Orange  River.'2  Schalk  van  Niekerk  bought  this 
stone  for  a  monstrous  price  in  the  eyes  of  the  poor  shepherd, — 
500  sheep,  10  oxen,  and  a  horse,  —  but  the  lucky  purchaser  sold 
it  easily  for  ^11,200  to  Lilienfeld  Brothers  of  Hopetown,  and 
it  was  subsequently  purchased  by  Earl  Dudley  for  ^£2  5,000.* 
This  extraordinary  gem,  which  soon  became  famous  as  "  the 
Star  of  South  Africa,"  drew  all  eyes  to  a  field  which  could  yield 
such  products,  and  the  existence  and  position  of  diamond  beds 
was  soon  further  assured  and  defined  by  the  finding  of  many 
smaller  stones  in  the  alluvial  gravel  on  the  banks  of  the  Vaal. 

Alluvial  deposits  form  the  surface  ground  on  both  sides  of 
this  river,  stretching  inland  for  several  miles.  In  some  places 
the  turns  of  the  stream  are  frequent  and  abrupt,  and  there  are 
many  dry  water-courses  which  were  probably  old  river  channels. 
The  flooding  and  winding  of  the  river  partly  accounts  for  the 
wide  spreading  of  the  deposits,  but  there  has  been  a  great  abrasion 
of  the  surface  of  the  land,  for  the  water-worn  gravel  sometimes 
covers  even  the  tops  of  the  ridges  and  kopjes  along  the  course 
of  the  river. 

This  gravel  was  a  medley  of  worn  and  rolled  chips  of  basalt, 
sandstone,  quartz,  and  trap,  intermingled  with  agates,  garnets, 

1  W.  Guybon  Atherstone,  1868.       2  "Among  the  Diamonds,"   1870-1871. 
3  Ibid.     (Accounts  of  this  discovery  differ  somewhat.)      Vide  Theal's  "  South 
Africa,"  Reunert's  "Diamonds  and  Gold,"  etc. 


i24      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

peridot,  jasper,  and  other  richly  colored  pebbles,  lying  in  and  on 
a  bedding  of  sand  and  clay.  Below  this  alluvial  soil  was  in  some 
places  a  calcareous  tufa,  but  usually  a  bed  rock  of  melaphyre  or 
a  clayey  shale  varying  in  color.  Scattered  thickly  through  the 
gravel  and  the  clay  along  the  banks  were  heavy  boulders  of 
basalt  and  trap  which  were  greatly  vexing  in  after  days  to  the 
diamond  diggers.1 

For  a  stretch  of  a  hundred  miles  above  the  Mission  Station 
at  Pniel  the  river  flows  through  a  series  of  rocky  ridges,  rolling 
back  from  either  bank  to  a  tract  of  grassy,  undulating  plains. 
Fancy  can  scarcely  picture  rock  heaps  more  contorted  and  mis- 
shapen. Only  prodigious  subterranean  forces  could  have  so 
rent  the  earth's  crust  and  protruded  jagged  dykes'  of  metamor- 
phic,  conglomerate,  and  amygdaloid  rocks,  irregularly  traversed 
by  veins  of  quartz,  and  heavily  sprinkled  with  big  bare  boulders 
of  basalt  and  trap.  Here  the  old  lacustrine  sedimentary  forma- 
tion of  the  South  African  high  veld  north  of  the  Zwarte  Bergen 
and  Witte  Bergen  ranges  has  plainly  been  riven  by  volcanic 
upheaval.  The  shale  and  sandstone  of  the  upper  and  lower 
Karoo  beds  have  been  washed  away  down  to  an  igneous  rock 
lying  between  the  shale  and  the  sandstone.  It  was  along  this 
stretch  of  the  river  that  the  first  considerable  deposit  of  diamonds 
in  South  Africa  was  uncovered.2 

For  more  than  a  year  since  the  discovery  of  the  first  diamond 
there  had  been  some  desultory  scratching  of  the  gravel  along  the 
Vaal  by  farmers  and  natives  in  looking  for  "  blink  klippe,"  and 
a  few  little  rough  diamonds  had  been  found  by  the  Hottentots, 
as  before  noted  ;  but  the  first  systematic  digging  and  sifting  of 
the  ground  was  begun  by  a  party  of  prospectors  from  Natal  at 
the  Mission  Station  of  Hebron.  This  was  the  forerunner  of  the 

1  "Diamonds    and    Gold   of  South   Africa,"     Reunert,    Cape  Town,    1893. 
"The   Diamond    Diggings    of  South    Africa,"     Payton,     1872.        "Among  the 
Diamonds,"    1870-1871. 

2  "  Diamonds  and  Gold  of  South  Africa,"    Reunert,    1893.       "  Among  the 
Diamonds,"    1870-1871.         "South     Africa,"    Theal,     1888-1893.          "On 
Diamonds,"  Sir  William  Crookes,   London,  1897. 


THE    DISCOVERY  125 

second  Great  Trek  to  the  Vaal  from  the  Cape,  a  myriad  of 
adventurers  that  spread  down  the  stream  like  a  locust  swarm, 
amazing  the  natives,  worrying  the  missionaries,  and  agitating  the 
pioneer  republics  on  the  north  and  the  east.1 

The  first  organized  party  of  prospectors  at  Hebron  on  the 
Vaal  was  formed  at  Maritzburg  in  Natal,  at  the  instance  of 
Major  Francis,  an  officer  in  the  English  army  service,  then 
stationed  at  that  town.  Captain  Rolleston  was  the  recog- 
nized leader,  and  after  a  long  plodding  march  over  the  Drakens- 
berg  and  across  the  veld,  the  little  company  reached  the  valley 
of  the  Vaal  in  November,  1869.  Up  to  the  time  of  its  arrival 
there  had  been  no  systematic  washing  of  the  gravel  edging  the 
river.  Two  experienced  gold  diggers  from  Australia,  Glenie 
and  King,  and  a  trader,  Parker,  had  been  attracted  to  the 
field  like  the  Natalians  by  the  reported  discoveries,  and  were 
prospecting  on  the  line  of  the  river  when  Captain  Rolleston's 
party  reached  Hebron.2  Their  prospecting  was  merely  looking 
over  the  surface  gravel  for  a  possible  gem,  but  the  wandering 
Koranas  were  more  sharp-sighted  and  lucky  in  picking  up  the 
elusive  little  crystals  that  occasionally  dotted  the  great  stretches 
of  alluvial  soil. 

It  was  determined  by  Captain  Rolleston  to  explore  the 
ground  as  thoroughly  as  practicable  from  the  river's  edge  for  a 
number  of  yards  up  the  bank,  and  the  washing  began  on  a  tract 
near  the  Mission  Station.  The  Australian  prospectors  joined 
the  party,  and  their  experience  in  placer  mining  was  of  service 
in  conducting  the  search  for  diamonds.  The  workers  shovelled 
the  gravel  into  cradles,  like  those  used  commonly  in  Australian 
and  American  placer  washing,  picked  out  the  coarser  stones  by 
hand,  washed  away  the  sand  and  lighter  pebbles,  and  saved  the 
heavier  mineral  deposit,  hoping  to  find  some  grains  of  gold  as 
well  as  diamonds  above  the  screens  of  their  cradles.  But  the 
returns  for  their  hard  labor  for  many  days  were  greatly  disap- 
pointing. They  washed  out  many  crystals  and  brilliant  pebbles, 

1  "South  Africa,"  Theal,  1888-1893.  "  Among  the  Diamonds,"  1870- 
1871.  2  "  Among  the  Diamonds,"  1870-1871. 


126      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

but  never  a  diamond  nor  an  atom  of  gold  dust.  Then  they 
pushed  down  the  river  more  than  twenty  miles  to  another  camp 
at  Klip-drift,  opposite  the  Mission  Station  at  Pniel.  Here  too 
they  washed  the  ground  for  days  without  finding  even  the  tiniest 
gem,  and  were  almost  on  the  point  ot  abandoning  their  dishearten- 
ing drudgery,  when  finally,  on  the  seventh  of  January,  1870,  the 
first  reward  of  systematic  work  in  the  field  came  in  the  appear- 
ance of  a  small  diamond  in  one  of  the  cradles.1 

This  little  fillip  of  encouragement  determined  their  continu- 
ance of  the  work,  and  a  party  from  British  Kaffraria  joined 
them  in  washing  the  gravel  in  places  that  seemed  most  promis- 
ing along  the  line  of  the  river.  It  was  agreed  that  the  first 
discovery  of  rich  diamond-bearing  ground  should  be  shared 
alike  by  both  parties,  but  there  was  nothing  to  share  for 
some  weeks.  Then  some  native  Koranas  were  induced  to 
point  out  to  the  Natalians  a  gravel-coated  hummock  or  kopje 
near  the  Klip-drift  camp,  where  they  had  picked  up  some  small 
diamonds.  When  the  prospectors  began  the  washing  of  the 
gravel  on  this  kopje,  it  was  soon  apparent  that  a  diamond  bed 
of  extraordinary  richness  had  been  reached  at  last.  Good  faith 
was  kept  with  the  company  from  Kingwilliamstown,  and  the 
combined  parties  worked  to  the  top  of  their  strength  in  shovel- 
ling and  washing  the  rich  bed.  The  lucky  men  kept  their 
mouths  closed,  as  a  rule,  and  did  not  intend  to  make  known  their 
good  fortune  ;  but  such  a  discovery  could  not  long  be  concealed 
from  visiting  traders  and  roaming  prospectors,  and  before  three 
months  had  passed  some  prying  eye  saw  half  a  tumblerful  of  the 
white  sparkling  crystals  in  their  camp,  and  the  news  spread  fast 
that  the  miners  had  washed  out  from  two  hundred  to  three  hun- 
dred stones,  ranging  in  size  from  the  smallest  gems  to  diamonds 
of  thirty  carats  or  more.2 

Then  a  motley  throng  of  fortune-hunters  began  to  pour  into 
the  valley  of  the  Vaal.  The  first  comers  were  those  living 
nearest  to  the  new  diamond  field,  —  farmers  and  tradesmen  from 
the  cattle  ranges  and  little  towns  of  the  Orange  Free  State. 

1  "  Among  the  Diamonds,"    1870-1871.  2  Ibid. 


THE    DISCOVERY  127 

Some  of  these  were  stolid  Boers,  drawn  to  the  fields  as  a  novel 
and  curious  spectacle,  but  disdaining  the  drudgery  of  shovelling 
and  washing  from  morning  till  night  for  the  chance  of  a  tiny 
bright  stone.  They  stared  for  a  while  at  the  laboring  diamond 
seekers,  and  then  turned  their  backs  on  the  field  contemptuously, 
and  rode  home  sneering  at  the  mania  which  was  dragging  its 
victims  for  hundreds  of  miles,  over  sun-cracked  and  dusty 
karroos,  to  hunt  for  white  pebbles  in  a  river  bed.  Still  there 
were  many  poor  farmers  who  caught  the  infectious  diamond 
fever  at  sight  of  the  open  field  and  a  few  sparkling  stones,  and 
they  camped  at  Klip-drift  or  went  on  farther  up  or  down  the 
river,  to  join,  as  well  as  they  knew  how,  in  the  search  for 
diamonds. 

Following  this  influx  from  the  Free  State  came  swarming 
in  men  of  every  class  and  condition  from  the  southern  English 
Colony,  and  from  the  ships  lying  in  the  coast  ports.  The 
larger  number  were  of  English  descent,  but  many  were  Dutch, 
and  hardly  a  nation  in  Europe  was  unrepresented.  Black 
grandsons  of  Guinea  coast  slaves  and  natives  of  every  dusky 
shade  streaked  the  show  of  white  faces.  Butchers,  bakers, 
sailors,  tailors,  lawyers,  blacksmiths,  masons,  doctors,  carpenters, 
clerks,  gamblers,  sextons,  laborers,  loafers,  —  men  of  every  pur- 
suit and  profession,  jumbled  together  in  queerer  association  than 
the  comrades  in  the  march  to  Finchley,  —  fell  into  line  in  a 
straggling  procession  to  the  Diamond  Fields.  Army  officers 
begged  furloughs  to  join  the  motley  troop,  schoolboys  ran  away 
from  school,  and  women  even  of  good  families  could  not  be  held 
back  from  joining  their  husbands  and  brothers  in  the  long  and 
wearisome  journey  to  the  banks  of  the  Vaal.1 

There  was  the  oddest  medley  of  dress  and  equipment:  shirts 
of  woollen, — blue,  brown,  gray,  and  red, — and  of  linen  and 
cotton,  —  white,  colored,  checked,  and  striped;  trim  jackets,  cord 
riding-breeches  and  laced  leggings,  and  "  hand  me  downs  "  from 

o  oo      o   * 

the  cheapest  ready-made  clothing  shops;  the  yellow  oilskins 
and  rubber  boots  of  the  sailor ;  the  coarse,  brown  corduroy  and 

1  "Among  the  Diamonds,"    1870-1871. 


128       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

canvas  suits,  and  long-legged,  stiff,  leather  boots  of  the  miner; 
the  ragged,  greasy  hats,  tattered  trousers  or  loin  cloths  of  the 
native  tribesmen  ;  jaunty  cloth  caps,  broad-brimmed  felt,  bat- 
tered straw,  garish  handkerchiefs  twisted  close  to  the  roots  of 
stiff  black  crowns,  or  tufts  of  bright  feathers  stuck  in  a  wiry  mat 
of  curls  ;  such  a  higgledy-piggledy  as  could  only  be  massed  in 
a  rush  from  African  coast  towns  and  native  kraals  to  a  field  of 
unknown  requirements,  in  a  land  whose  climate  swung  daily  be- 
tween a  scorch  and  a  chill,  where  men  in  the  same  hour  were 
smothered  in  dust  and  drenched  in  a  torrent. 

It  is  doubtful  if  a  single  one  of  this  fever-stricken  company 
had  ever  seen  a  diamond  field  or  had  the  slightest  experience 
in  rough  diamond  winning,  but  no  chilling  doubt  of  them- 
selves or  their  luck  restrained  them  from  rushing  to  their 
fancied  Golconda.  Their  ideal  field  was  much  nearer  a  mirror 
of  the  valley  of  Sindbad  than  the  actual  African  river  bank,  and 
it  was  certain  that  many  would  be  as  bitterly  disappointed  by 
the  rugged  stretch  of  gravel  at  Klip-drift  as  the  gay  Portuguese 
cavaliers  were  at  the  sight  of  the  Manica  gold  placers. 

Everything  in  the  form  of  a  carriage  from  a  chaise  to  a  buck- 
wagon  was  pressed  into  service,  but  the  best  available  transport 
was  the  big  trekking  ox-wagon  of  the  Boer  pioneer.  This  was  a 
heavily  framed,  low-hung  wagon,  about  twenty  feet  long  and  five 
and  a  half  feet  broad.  In  this  conveyance  more  than  a  dozen 
men  often  packed  themselves  and  their  camping  outfit  and  food. 
An  exceptionally  well-equipped  party  carried  bacon,  potatoes, 
onions,  tea,  coffee,  sugar,  condensed  milk,  flour,  biscuits,  dried 
peas,  rice,  raisins,  pickles,  and  Cape  brandy.  The  total  weight 
of  load  allowed,  including  the  living  freight,  was  limited  to 
seven  thousand  pounds.1 

East  London,  the  nearest  port,  was  something  more  than 
four  hundred  miles  from  the  diamond  field,  and  Cape  Town 
nearly  seven  hundred.  Durban,  Port  Alfred,  and  Port  Elizabeth 
were  almost  equally  distant,  as  the  crow  flies,  approximately  four 

1  "  The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Charles  Alfred  Payton,  Lon- 
don, 1872. 


THE    DISCOVERY  129 

hundred  and  fifty  miles ;  but  the  length  of  the  journey  to  the 
Vaal  could  not  be  measured  by  any  bare  comparison  of  air-lined 
distances.  The  roads,  at  best,  were  rough  trampled  tracks, 
changing,  after  a  rainfall,  to  beds  of  mire.  Their  tortuous 
courses  rambled  from  settlement  to  settlement,  or  from  one 
farmhouse  to  another  over  the  veld,  and  were  often  wholly  lost 
in  the  shifting  sands  of  the  karroo.  It  was  a  tedious  and  diffi- 
cult journey  by  land  even  from  one  seacoast  town  to  another, 
and  fifty  miles  from  the  coast  the  traveller  was  fortunate  if  his 
way  was  marked  by  even  a  cattle  path.1 

When  the  rain  fell  in  torrents  with  the  lurid  flashes  and 
nerve-shaking  crash  of  South  African  thunder-storms,  the  dia- 
mond seekers  huddled  together  under  the  stifling  cover  of  their 
wagons,  while  fierce  gusts  shook  and  strained  every  strip  of 
canvas  and  water  drops  spurted  through  every  crevice.  In  fair 
weather  some  were  glad  to  spread  their  blankets  on  the  ground 
near  the  wagon,  and  stretch  their  limbs,  cramped  by  their  pack- 
ing like  sardines  in  a  box.  On  the  plains  they  had  no  fuel  for 
cooking  except  what  they  could  gather  of  dry  bullock's  dung. 
Sometimes  no  headway  could  be  made  against  the  blinding  dust- 
storms,  that  made  even  the  tough  African  cattle  turn  tail  to  the 
blasts,  and  clogged  the  eyes  and  ears  and  every  pore  of  exposed 
skin  with  irritating  grit  and  powder.  Sometimes  the  rain  fell  so 
fast  that  the  river  beds  were  filled  in  a  few  hours  with  muddy 
torrents,  which  blocked  any  passage  by  fording  for  days  and 
even  weeks  at  a  time,  and  kept  the  impatient  diamond  seekers 
fuming  in  vain  on  their  banks.  Payton's  party  was  forty-six 
days  in  its  passage  from  Port  Elizabeth  to  the  Diamond  Fields 
without  meeting  with  any  serious  delays,  and  journeys  lasting 
two  months  were  not  uncommon.2 

Still,  in  spite  of  all  obstacles,  privations,  and  discomforts,  the 
long  journey  to  the  fields  was  not  wholly  monotonous  and  un- 
pleasant. As  there  was  no  beaten  way,  the  prospectors  chose 

1  "South  Africa,"  George  McCall  Theal,  1888-1893. 

2  "  The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton.       "  South  Africa  Dia- 
mond Fields  and  Journey  to  Mines,"  William  Jacob  Morton,  New  York,  1877. 


130      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

their  own  path,  riding  by  day  and  camping  at  night  as  their 
fancy  led  them.  In  ascending  to  the  tableland  of  the  interior 
from  Natal,  there  were  shifting  and  stirring  visions  of  mountain 
peaks,  terraces,  gorges,  and  valleys. 

On  the  higher  terraces  there  was  not  the  luxuriance  of  the 
coast,  —  the  huge  tree  ferns  with  feathery  fronds,  the  towering 
masses  of  palms,  the  drooping  festoons  of  climbing  vines,  the 
exquisite  flowers  :  spiked  ansellias  with  their  pale  yellow  blos- 
soms, barred  and  spotted  with  red,  pure  white,  sweet-scented 
clusters  of  mystacidium,  and  orchids  of  marvellous  variety  and 
hue,  —  but  even  the  highest  upland  tree  growth  had  beauties  of 
its  own.  On  the  slopes  of  the  Drakensberg  the  wild  chestnut, 
the  Natal  mahogany,  the  white  pear  and  iron  wood  grow  sturdily, 
and  the  common  yellow  wood,  stink  wood,  bogabog,  and  sneeze 
wood  flourish  in  spite  of  their  rude  names.1 

Amid  this  varied  scenery  they  could  linger  and  wind  about 
as  they  pleased,  and  every  turn  of  their  path  revealed  new  charms 
of  line  and  color.  As  they  descended  the  mountain  flanks  some 
marked  how  the  lacustrine  deposits  of  past  ages  had  overspread 
the  face  of  the  land  with  their  covering  of  sandstone  and  shale, 
even  skirting  the  summits  of  the  highest  peaks  at  a  height  of 
more  than  six  thousand  feet,  as  was  plainly  shown  on  the  Com- 
passberg.'2  On  the  plateau  below  they  saw  how  the  craggy  hills, 
pointed  spitz-kopjes,  and  columnar  ridges  of  the  trappean  rocks 
projected  above  the  sedimentary  cover  of  the  karroo. 

Throughout  the  Orange  Free  State,  but  especially  in  the 
neighborhood  of  the  valleys  of  the  Orange  and  Vaal,  these  vol- 
canic rock  elevations  are  common,  sometimes  massed  in  irregular 
rows  and  often  rising  in  the  most  jagged  and  fantastic  shapes. 
"  When  we  see  them  at  the  surface,"  wrote  the  geologist  Wyley 
In  1856,  "they  look  like  walls  running  across  the  country,  or 
more  frequently  form  a  narrow,  stony  ridge  like  a  wall  that 
has  been  thrown  down.  The  rock  of  which  they  are  composed, 
greenstone  or  basalt,  is  known  by  the  local  name  of  iron  stone, 

1  "The  Colony  of  Natal,"  J.  Forsyth  Ingram. 

2  "Among  the  Diamonds,"   1870-1871. 


THE    DISCOVERY  131 

from  its  great  hardness  and  toughness,  and  from  its  great  weight. 
The  origin  of  these  dykes  is  well  known.  They  have  been  pro- 
duced by  volcanic  agency,  which,  acting  from  below  upon  hori- 
zontal beds  of  stratified  rock,  has  cracked  and  fissured  them  at 
right  angles  to  their  planes  of  stratification,  and  these  vertical 
cracks  have  been  filled  up  with  the  melted  rock  or  the  lava  from 
below.  The  perpendicular  fissures  through  which  it  has  found 
its  way  upwards  are  seldom  seen,  nor  should  we  expect  to  see 
much  of  them,  for  it  is  precisely  along  the  line  of  these  that  the 
rocks  have  been  most  broken  up  and  shattered  and  the  denuda- 
tion has  been  greatest." 

Even  in  the  crossing  of  the  karroos  there  were  curious  and 
awesome  sights  to  attract  and  impress  the  mind  of  a  traveller 
beholding  for  the  first  time  these  desert  wastes  so  widely  spread 
over  the  face  of  South  Africa.  They  differ  little  in  appearance 
except  in  size.  The  Great  or  Central  Karroo,  which  lies  beneath 
the  foot-hills  of  the  Zwarte  Bergen  range,  has  a  sweep  to  the 
north  of  more  than  three  hundred  miles  in  a  rolling  plateau, 
ranging  in  elevation  from  two  to  three  thousand  feet.  Day 
after  day,  as  the  diamond  seekers  from  Cape  Town  plodded  on 
with  their  creaking  wagons,  the  same  purpled  brown  face  was 
outspread  before  them  of  the  stunted  flowering  shrub  which  has 
given  its  name  to  the  desert,  spotted  with  patches  of  sun-cracked 
clay  or  hot  red  sand.  To  some  of  the  Scotchmen  this  scrub  had 
the  cheery  face  of  the  heather  of  their  own  Highlands,  and  home- 
sick Englishmen  would  ramble  far  through  the  furze  to  pick  the 
bright  yellow  flowers  of  plants  that  recalled  the  gorse  of  their 
island  homes.1  These  common  bushes,  rarely  rising  a  foot  in 
height,  and  the  thick,  stunted  camelthorn,  were  almost  the  only 
vegetable  coating  of  the  desert. 

Straggling  over  this  plane  ran  the  quaint  ranges  of  flat- 
topped  hummocks  and  pointed  spitz-kopjes,  streaked  with 
ragged  ravines  torn  by  the  floods,  but  utterly  parched  for  most 
of  the  year.  Shy  meerkats,  Cynictis  •penicillata^  weasel-like  crea- 

1  Special  correspondence  London  Chronicle  and  other  English  journals,  Novem- 
ber, 1899. 


132       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

tares  with  furry  coats,  peered  cautiously  from  their  burrows  at 
the  strange  procession  of  fortune-hunters,  and  from  myriads  of 
the  mammoth  ant-hills  that  dot  the  face  of  the  desert  innumer- 
able legions  of  ants  swarmed  on  the  sand  along  the  track  of  the 
wagons.  Sometimes  at  nightfall  the  queer  aard-vark  lurked 
upon  the  ant-heap  and  licked  up  the  crawling  insects  by  thou- 
sands. Far  over  the  heads  of  the  travellers  soared  the  preda- 
tory eagles  and  swooping  hawks,  harrying  the  pigeons  and  dwarf 
doves  that  clustered  at  daybreak  to  drink  at  the  edge  of  every 
stagnant  pool.1 

Even  in  the  earliest  years  of  the  Dutch  advance  into  South 
Africa,  when  wild  beasts  browsed  in  troops  on  every  grassy  plain 
and  valley  and  the  poorest  marksman  could  kill  game  almost  at 
will,  the  karroo  was  shunned  by  almost  every  living  creature 
except  in  the  fickle  season  of  rainfall.  The  lion  skirted  the 
desert  edge  warily,  unwilling  to  venture  far  from  a  certain  water- 
brook  or  pool.  There  was  nothing  on  the  bare  karroo  to  tempt 
the  rhinoceros  from  his  bed  in  green-leaved  thickets,  and  only 
the  wide-roaming  antelopes  (trekbok)  rambled  for  pasturage  far 
over  the  sparsely  coated  and  parched  desert  waste.  If  this  was 
true  in  the  days  when  the  tip  of  Africa  was  swarming  with  animal 
life,  it  is  not  surprising  that  the  diamond  seekers  in  1869  and  1870 
rarely  saw  any  living  mark  for  their  rifles  when  they  journeyed 
over  the  desert.  Rock-rabbits,  akin  to  the  scriptural  coney, 
scampering  to  their  holes,  were  often  the  largest  game  in  sight 
for  days  at  a  time,  and  it  was  counted  remarkable  luck  when  any 
hunter  put  a  bullet  through  a  little  brown  antelope,  a  grysbok,  or 
springbok.2  The  springboks  still  haunted  the  Great  Karroo,  for 
they  were  particularly  fond  of  its  stunted  bush  growth,  and  in 
the  rainy  season  many  droves  of  these  antelopes  could  be  seen 
browsing  warily  or  flying  in  panic  from  the  spring  of  the  cheetah, 
the  African  hunting  leopard ;  but  most  of  the  bigger  game, 
blesbok,  hartebeest,  koodoo,  and  wildebeest,  that  used  to  feed 

1  "A  Breath  from  the  Veld,"  John  Guille  Millais,  London,  1895.      "Among 
the  Diamonds,"   1870-1871. 

2  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,   1872. 


THE    DISCOVERY  133 

greedily  on  the  same  pasture,  had  been  killed  or  driven  away  by 
the  keen  hunting  of  the  years  that  followed  the  taking  of  the 
Cape  by  the  English.1 

Sometimes  the  clear  sky  of  the  horizon  was  blurred  by  the 
advancing  of  monstrous  swarms  of  locusts,  the  "  black  snow- 
storms "  of  the  natives,  sweeping  over  the  face  of  the  land  like 
the  scourge  of  devouring  flames,  chased  by  myriads  of  locust 
birds,  and  coating  the  ground  for  miles  around  at  nightfall  with 
a  crawling,  heaving  coverlet.  Then  might  be  heard  the  hoarse 

O'  O  D 

trump  of  the  cranes  winging  their  way  over  the  desert  and  drop- 
ping on  the  field  strewn  with  locusts  to  gorge  on  their  insect 
prey.  Or  the  travellers  saw  the  slate-white  secretary  bird  stalk- 
ing about  with  his  self-satisfied  strut  and  scraping  up  mouthfuls 
with  his  eagle-like  bill. 

More  marvellous  than  the  locust  clouds  were  the  amazing 
mirages  that  deceived  even  the  keen-eyed  ostriches  with  their 
counterfeit  lakes  and  wood-fringed  streams,  so  temptingly  near, 
but  so  provokingly  receding,  like  the  fruits  hanging  over  the 
thirsting  Tantalus.  Sometimes  hilltops  were  reared  high  above 
the  horizon,  distorted  to  mountainous  size  and  melting  suddenly 
in  thin  air  or  a  flying  blur.  Now  a  solitary  horseman  was  seen 
to  swoop  over  the  desert  in  the  form  of  a  mammoth  bird,  or  a 
troop  of  antelopes  were  changed  to  charging  cavalry.  No  trick 
of  illusion  and  transformation  was  beyond  the  conjuring  power 
of  the  flickering  atmosphere  charged  with  the  radiating  heat  of 
the  desert.2 

When  the  prospectors  crossed  the  karroo  and  entered  the 

1  "A  Breath  from  the  Veld,"  John  Guille  Millais,  London,  1895. 

2  Despatches  of  Julian  Ralph  and  other  special  correspondents  to  London  jour- 
nals, October-December,  1899.      "Sketches  and  Studies  in  South  Africa,"  W.  J. 
K.  Little,  London,  1899.      "Portraits  of  the  Game  and  Wild  Animals  of  Southern 
Africa,"  W.  G.  Harris,  London,  1840.      "The  Large  Game  and  Natural  His- 
tory of  South    and    Southeast   Africa,"    W.    H.    Drummond,    Edinburgh,    1875. 
"Travel   and   Adventure    in   Southeast   Africa,"   F.    C.   Selous,   London,    1893. 
"Kloof  and  Karroo,"   H.  A.  Bryden,  London,  1889.      "Days  and  Nights  by 
the  Desert,"  P.  Gillmore,  London,  1888.      "Gun  and  Camera  in  South  Africa," 
H.  A.  Bryden,  London,  1893. 


134      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

stretches  of  pasture  land  which  the  Dutch  called  veld,  the  scenes 
of  their  marches  were  much  more  lively  and  cheery.  Little  farm- 
houses dotted  the  plains  and  valleys,  rude  cottages  of  clay-plas- 
tered stones  or  rough  timbers,  but  hospitable  with  fires  blazing 
on  open  hearths,  big  iron  pots  hanging  from  cranes  and  simmer- 
ing with  stews,  and  broad-faced,  beaming  vrouws  and  clusters  of 
chunky  boys  and  girls  greeted  the  arrival  of  an  ox-wagon  from 
the  coast  as  a  welcome  splash  in  the  stagnant  stream  of  their  daily 
life.1 

At  some  of  the  halting  places  on  the  banks  of  streams,  or 
where  plentiful  water  was  stored  in  natural  pans  or  artificial 
ponds,  the  extraordinary  fertility  of  the  irrigated  soil  of  South 
Africa  was  plainly  to  be  seen  in  luxuriant  gardens,  with  brill- 
iant flower-beds  and  heavy-laden  fruit  trees  and  vines.  Here 
figs,  pomegranates,  oranges,  lemons,  and  grapes  ripened  side  by 
side,  and  hung  more  tempting  than  apples  of  Eden  in  the  sight 
of  the  thirsting,  sunburnt,  dust-choked  men  who  had  plodded 
so  far  over  the  parched  karroos.  They  stretched  their  cramped 
legs  and  aching  backs  in  the  grateful  shade  of  spreading  branches, 
and  watched  with  half-shut  eyes  the  white  flocks  nibbling  on  the 
pasture  land,  and  the  black  and  red  cattle  scattered  as  far  as  the 
eye  could  see  over  the  veld.  Tame  ostriches  stalked  fearlessly 
about  them,  often  clustering  like  hens  at  the  door  of  the  farm- 
house to  pick  up  a  mess  of  grain  or  meal,  apparently  heedless  of 
any  approach,  but  always  alert  and  likely  to  resent  any  familiarity 
from  a  stranger  with  a  kick  as  sharp  and  staggering  as  any  ever 
dealt  by  a  mule's  hind  leg. 

The  interior  of  the  homes  in  these  oases  was  not  so  invit- 
ing, for  the  rooms,  at  best,  were  small  and  bare  to  the  eye  of 
a  townsman.  But  some  were  comparatively  neatly  kept,  with 
smoothly  cemented  floors,  cupboards  of  quaintly  figured  china 
and  earthenware,  hangings  and  rugs  of  leopard,  fox,  jackal,  and 
antelope  skins  and  brackets  of  curving  horns  loaded  with  hunt- 
ing arms  and  garnished  with  ostrich  feathers.  For  the  guests 

1  "  Among  the  Diamonds,"  1870-1871.  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South 
Africa,"  Payton,  1872.  "  South  Africa  Diamond  Fields,"  Morton,  1876. 


THE    DISCOVERY  135 

there  was  probably  the  offer  of  a  freshly  killed  antelope  or  sheep  ; 
but  the  farmer's  family  was  often  content  with  "  biltong,"  the 
dried  meat  that  hung  in  strips  or  was  piled  in  stacks  under  his 
curing  shed. 

Near  every  house  was  the  accompanying  kraal  or  open-walled 
circle  for  the  confinement  of  the  flocks  at  night,  built  of  stones, 
and  usually  so  bedded  and  filthy  with  fresh  dung  that  a  heavy 
percentage  of  the  farmers'  sheep  died  yearly  from  foot-rot  or  scab.1 
Close  to  the  kraal  was  the  water  reservoir  for  the  flocks  and  the 
household  use,  unless  the  farm  lay  on  the  bank  of  an  unfailing 
stream.  These  collections  of  water  were  commonly  hill  drainage, 
stored  in  long,  narrow  ponds  by  rough  dams  across  ravines,  or 
the  drainage  and  rainfall  filling  shallow  natural  basins  which  the 
Boers  call  "  pans."  In  the  early  morning  the  birds  flew  from  all 
quarters  to  these  ponds.  Wild  ducks,  geese,  plover,  sandgrouse, 
and  flocks  of  pigeons  and  doves  hovered  over  the  pools  and 
splashed  and  dabbled  in  the  water,  while  the  blue-gray  Kafir 
cranes  stalked  warily  along  the  brink. 

These  basins  are  quite  numerous  in  the  country  lying 
between  the  Orange  and  the  Vaal,  as  well  as  throughout  the 
Transvaal.  The  light  earth  washed  down  the  hill  slopes  was 
largely  calcareous,  and  incrusted  the  grasses  and  roots  of  the 
basin  in  a  calc-tufa  which  is  almost  impervious  to  water.  So 
the  pans  became  excellent  natural  reservoirs,  though  there  was, 
of  course,  a  heavy  loss  from  evaporation.  No  calamity  is  so 
dreaded  by  the  graziers  as  the  failure  of  their  water-supply,  for 
it  has  often  caused  the  loss  of  a  flock  and  the  ruin  of  the  poor 
owner.  Therefore  the  pans  are  highly  valued  and  strictly  re- 
served, and  the  dams  are  daily  inspected  lest  a  burrowing  land 
crab  should  open  the  way  for  a  rush  of  water  that  would  empty 
the  reservoir.2  When  a  settler  was  fortunate  in  getting  a  tract 
of  land  with  a  pan  or  a  water-spring,  he  almost  invariably  gave 
the  name  to  his  farm,  as  Dutoitspan,  Dorstfontein,  Jagersfontein, 

1  "  On  Veld  and  Farm,"  Frances  MacNab,  London,  1897.       "South  Africa 
Diamond  Fields,"  Morton,  New  York,  1877. 

2  "  Among  the  Diamonds,"  1870-1871. 


136       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF    SOUTH    AFRICA 

Bultfontein,  —  names  of  inconsiderable  little  patches  on  the  face 
of  South  Africa,  which  were  destined  to  become  memorable  by 
approaching  revelations.1 

Attracted  by  the  good  pasturage  and  water  and  the  sight  of 
flowers,  fruits,  and  birds,  even  the  eager  diamond  seekers  were 
not  loath  to  linger  for  a  day  at  one  of  these  oases  and  rest  them- 
selves and  their  cattle  before  pushing  on  to  the  Vaal.  As  they 
drew  near  to  their  goal  the  face  of  the  country  began  to  change. 
After  passing  the  Modder  River,  the  grassy  plains  stretched 
out  wider  and  longer  and  more  gently  undulating,  and  the  mirage 
was  more  greatly  magnifying  and  illusive.  Herds  of  wild  game, 
chiefly  springbok,  blesbok,  hartebeest,  wildebeest,  and  koodoo, 
were  now  frequently  seen,  and  the  ears  of  the  travellers  were 
tickled  with  the  cheery  karack-karack  of  flying  korhaan  and 
the  pipes  of  red-legged  plover.  There  are  black  headed  or  veld 
korhaan  and  bush  korhaan.  These  birds,  which  are  very  plenti- 
ful along  the  Vaal  River  and  about  Kimberley,  belong  to  the 
smaller  bustard  species.  The  cock  bird  of  the  veld  korhaan  has 
a  black  head  with  white  spots  on  the  sides.  The  top  of  the 
head  or  crest  is  of  a  reddish  gray  color.  The  back  is  also  red- 
dish gray,  the  markings  of  the  feathers  being  in  rings  or  stripes. 
The  wings  are  black-and-white,  and  the  legs  yellow.  The  hen 
birds  have  reddish  gray  heads,  but  otherwise  are  similar  in  feather 
to  the  cock  bird.  The  bird  derives  its  name  from  the  Dutch 
word  knor,  to  scold,  and  haan,  hen  or  bird,  on  account  of  the 
scolding  noise  made  by  the  male  bird  as  it  rises  from  the  ground. 
The  original  word,  knorhaan,  has  been  corrupted  into  korhaan. 
The  bush  korhaan  has  a  gray  head  with  a  light  blue  patch  on  the 
crown,  just  back  of  which  is  a  pink-brown  crest  an  inch  and  a 
half  long.  The  back  is  covered  with  brown-and-white  feathers 
with  diamond-pointed  markings.  The  lower  part  of  the  leg  is 
yellow  and  the  upper  part  blue.  The  Dutch  call  one  variety 

1  "  Achtzehn  Jahre  in  Sud  Africa,"  E.  J.  Karrstrom,  Leipzig,  1899.  "  Seven 
Years  in  South  Africa,"  Emil  Holub,  London,  1881.  "South  Africa,"  A.  H. 
Keane,  London,  1895.  "South  Africa  of  To-day,"  Captain  F.  E.  Younghusband, 
London,  1898.  "Ten  Years  in  South  Africa,"  J.  W.  D.  Moodie,  London, 
1835.  "South  Africa,"  George  McCall  Theal,  1888-1893. 


THE    DISCOVERY  137 

of  birds  somewhat  resembling  the  bush  korhaan  rudely  "  dik- 
kops,"  thick  heads,  from  their  appearance  when  wounded ;  but 
they  are  none  the  less  handsome  birds,  and  they  were  eagerly 
shot  and  eaten  by  the  diamond  seekers  on  the  way  to  the  fields 
and  in  the  camps  on  the  river.  There  were  great  numbers,  too, 
of  the  paauw  or  cape  bustard  near  the  Modder  River,  and  red- 
winged  partridges  and  Guinea  fowl  that  gave  a  welcome  variety 
to  the  meals  of  the  travellers.1 

Over  the  rolling  ground  the  prospectors  pressed  rapidly  to 
the  Diamond  Fields  and  soon  reached  the  river  border  where  the 
plains  ran  into  the  barrier  of  ridges  of  volcanic  rocks.  Jolting 
heavily  over  these  rough  heaps  and  sinking  deeply  in  the  red 
sand  wash  of  the  valleys,  the  heavy  ox-wagons  were  slowly  tugged 
to  the  top  of  the  last  ridge  above  Pniel,  opposite  the  opened 
diamond  beds  of  Klip-drift,  where  the  anticipated  Golconda  was 
full  in  sight.  Here  the  Vaal  River  winds  with  a  gently  flowing 
stream,  two  hundred  yards  or  more  in  width,  through  a  steeply 
shelving,  oblong  basin  something  over  a  mile  and  a  half  in  length 
and  a  mile  across.  A  thin  line  of  willows  and  cotton-woods 
marked  the  edge  of  the  stream  on  both  banks.  On  the  descend- 
ing slope  toward  the  river  stood  the  clustering  tents  and  wagons 
of  the  pilgrims  waiting  to  cross  the  stream. 

In  the  dry  season  the  Vaal  was  easily  fordable  by  ox-wagons 
at  a  point  in  this  basin,  and  the  ford,  which  the  Boers  call 
"  drift,"  gave  the  name  to  the  shore  and  camp  opposite  Pniel, 
—  "Klip-drift,"  "Rocky-ford."  When  the  river  was  swollen 
by  rains,  the  impatient  fortune-hunters  were  forced  to  wait,  fum- 
ing, in  sight  of  the  diamond  diggings  until  the  flood  subsided ; 
but, a  few  months  after  the  rush  began,  a  big,  flat-bottomed  ferry- 
boat, called  a  pont,  was  constructed  to  carry  over  the  wagons 
and  cattle,  while  the  men  crossed  in  rowboats,  making  regular 
ferry  trips  between  Pniel  and  Klip-drift. 

How  stirring  were  the  sights  and  sounds  from  the  ridge  at 
Pniel  to  every  newcomer  while  the  swarming  diamond  seekers 
were  crossing  the  river  and  spreading  out  over  the  northern 

1  "Among  the  Diamonds,"   1870-1871. 


138       THE    DIAMOND    MINES   OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

bank!  —  the  confused  clustering  at  the  ford  —  the  rambling  of 
stragglers  along  the  shore  —  the  gravel  cracking  and  grinding 
under  the  hoofs  of  the  horses  and  ponies  racing  along  the  bank 
and  rearing,  plunging,  and  bucking  at  the  check  of  the  bits  and 
prick  of  the  spurs  —  the  outspanning  and  inspanning  of  hun- 
dreds of  oxen  —  the  swaying  and  creaking  wagons  —  the  writh- 
ing, darting  lash  of  the  cracking  whips  of  the  drivers  —  the 
sulking,  balking  oxen,  driven  into  long,  straining  lines  that 
dragged  the  ponderous,  canvas-arched  "prairie-schooners" 
through  the  turbid  water  and  over  the  quaking  sands  —  the 
whistling,  shouting,  yelling,  snorting,  neighing,  braying,  squeak- 
ing, grinding,  splashing  babel  —  the  scrambling  up  the  steep 
Klip-drift  bank  —  the  scattering  of  the  newcomers  —  the 
perching  of  the  white-topped  wagons  and  the  camp-tents  like 
monstrous  gulls  on  every  tenable  lodging  place  on  bank,  gully, 
and  hillside  —  the  scurrying  about  for  wood  and  water  —  the 
crackling,  smoking,  flaming  heaps  of  the  camp  fires  —  the 
steaming  pots  and  kettles  swinging  on  cranes  —  the  great  placer 
face,  pockmarked  with  holes  and  heaps  of  reddish  sand,  clay, 
and  gravel  —  the  long  stretches  of  the  miners'  rockers  and 
troughs  at  the  water's  edge  —  and  chief  of  all  in  interest,  the 
busy  workmen,  sinking  pits  and  throwing  out  shovelfuls  of 
earth,  filling  buckets  and  hauling  them  up  with  ropes,  loading 
and  shaking  the  rockers,  driving  carts  full  of  heavy  gravel  to 
the  water  troughs,  returning  for  new  loads,  scraping  and  sorting 
the  fine,  heavy  pebbles  on  tables  or  flat  rocks  or  boards  spread 
on  the  ground  ! 

No  labored,  crawling  recital  can  compass  and  picture  in 
print  any  approach  to  the  instant  impress  on  the  eye  and  ear 
of  the  moving  drama  on  the  banks  of  the  Vaal.  Observer  after 
observer  groped  vainly  for  graphic  comparison.  "  Klip-drift  is  a 
swarm  of  bees  whose  hive  is  upset,"  said  one  ,  "  a  bank  lined 
with  ant-hills,"  wrote  another,  prosily  ;  "  a  wild  rabbit  warren, 
scurried  by  a  fox,"  ventured  a  third ;  "  an  insane  asylum 
turned  loose  on  a  beach,"  sneered  a  fourth.  It  was  a  mush- 
room growth  of  a  seething  placer-mining  camp  in  the  heart 


THE    DISCOVERY 


of  the  pasture  lands  of  South  Africa.  To  old  Australian  and 
American  miners  it  had  a  patent  likeness  to  familiar  camps  and 
diggings,  but  its  local  coloring  was  glaringly  vivid  and  unique.1 

1  "  Among  the  Diamonds,"  1870-1871.  "  The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South 
Africa,"  Charles  Alfred  Payton,  London,  1872.  "  South  Africa  Diamond  Fields," 
Morton,  New  York,  1877.  "To  the  Cape  for  Diamonds,"  Frederick  Boyle, 
London,  1873.  "Diamond  Fields  of  South  Africa,  by  One  who  has  visited  the 
Fields,"  New  York,  1872. 


Pniel  Diggings. 


CHAPTER   V 


THE    CAMPS    ON    THE    VAAL 

EFORE  calling  to  view  the  spreading  of  the 
diamond  seekers  along  the  line  of  the  Vaal 
River,  the  rearing  of  successive  camps,  and  the 
growing  pursuit  of  gems  in  the  gravel,  it  is 
essential  to  trace  the  progress  of  diamond 
mining  from  its  original  development  on  the 
water-shed  of  the  Indus,  and  to  account  in  great  measure  for 
the  blundering,  confusion,  and  failures  in  the  new  Diamond 
Fields  by  showing  how  crude  and  imperfect  were  any  known 
methods  of  winning  the  precious  stones  at  the  time  of  the  South 
African  discoveries. 

From  earliest  history  there  had  been  no  change  and  no 
prospect  of  change  in  the  diamond  mining  of  India  (described 
in  Chapter  i).  In  the  Deccan  diamond  fields,  as  in  the  other 
congested  districts,  there  was  such  an  influx  of  poor  natives  that 
no  labor-saving  contrivances  were  sought  for,  and  the  diamond- 
bearing  gravels  were  lifted  and  washed  by  hand  as  they  had  been 
by  the  first  generation  of  workers.  There  had  been  no  compe- 
tition with  the  Deccan  field,  and  no  considerable  production 
outside  of  it,  until  the  diamonds  of  the  Brazilian  fields  were 
made  known  to  the  Portuguese  in  the  year  1728.  As  soon  as 
the  Home  Government  learned  of  this  discovery,  the  diamonds 
in  Brazil  were  declared  to  be  State  property,  and  for  a  hundred 
years  diamond  mining  was  a  Crown  monopoly.  This  con- 
dition was  a  clog  to  any  possible  advance  in  the  methods  of 
mining.  There  was  a  constant  drain  on  the  industry  without 
any  effort  to  develop  it  systematically,  thoroughly,  or  economi- 
cally. 

140 


THE   CAMPS    ON   THE   VAAL  141 

The  chief  deposits  were  found,  at  first,  in  river  beds  and 
ravines  in  a  breccia  of  clay,  quartz  pebbles,  and  sand,  charged 
with  oxide  of  iron.  Some  of  the  richest  beds  were  opened  along 
the  rivers  Jequetinhonha  and  Pardo  in  the  valley  of  Sejues,  and 
on  the  line  of  the  rivers  Aboite,  Andaja,  da  Serreno,  da  Prata, 
and  San  Francisco  in  the  province  of  Minas  Geraes.1 

The  diamond-bearing  ground  was  worked  under  govern- 
ment agents  or  leased  to  contractors.  Quick  returns  were  the 
first  object.  So  gangs  of  slaves  were  put  on  the  grounds, 
regardless  of  loss,  if  only  the  cream  of  the  fields  was  skimmed. 
In  the  dry  season  the  beds  of  the  smaller  sierran  streams  were 
nearly  or  wholly  dry.  Underlying  the  surface  wash  of  sand  in 
the  bed  was  the  formacao  or  cascalho,  heavy  diamond-bearing 
gravel  intermixed  with  boulders.  The  alluvial  soil  was  gen- 
erally from  eight  to  twenty  feet  thick,  a  silicious  sand  chiefly, 
deep  colored  by  ferruginous  clay.  The  diamonds  and  other 
minerals  of  high  specific  gravity  were  held  in  the  bottom  layer 
of  this  alluvium,  usually  cemented  in  a  coarse  pudding-stone  of 
quartz  and  itacolumite  —  the  cascalho.  The  sand  was  rudely 
scraped  away  or  carried  off  in  pans,  the  boulders  pried  out,  and 
the  cascalho  exposed.  Then  the  gravel  was  collected  labori- 
ously in  pans  and  piled  in  heaps  to  await  the  rainy  season,  when 
the  streams  filled  the  dry  courses  and  there  was  water  at  hand 
for  washing  the  gravel. 

Bacus  or  shallow  pits  were  sunk  in  the  sand  along  the  brink 
of  the  streams,  and  in  these  pits  a  few  panfuls  of  gravel  were 
thrown.  The  bottom  of  the  bacu  was  made  to  slope  so  that 
the  dashing  of  water  on  the  gravel  heap  would  readily  wash  away 
the  clinging  sand  and  the  lighter  and  larger  stones.  The  expert 
slaves  washed  the  heaps  in  the  bacus  with  splashes  of  water  cast 

1  "The  Diamond  Fields  of  Brazil,"  Report  of  United  States  Minister  Bryan, 
March  12,  1899,  conveying  report  of  American  Secretary  of  Legation,  Dawson. 
"  A  Treatise  on  Gems,"  Lewis  Feuchtwanger,  M.D.,  1867.  "An  Account 
of  Diamonds  found  in  Brazil,"  James  Castro  de  Sarmente,  M.D.  "Genuine 
Account  of  the  Present  State  of  the  Diamond  Trade  in  the  Dominions  of  Portugal," 
a  Lisbon  merchant,  London,  1785.  "Travels  in  South  America,"  J.  J.  von 
Tschudi. 


142      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

from  concave  wooden  plates  with  a  peculiar  whirl  which  has- 
tened the  separation  of  the  heavier  gravel.  This  concentrate, 
containing  most  of  the  diamonds  in  the  cascalho,  was  then 
washed  again  in  a  batea,  a  wooden  dish  with  a  depression  in  the 
centre.  By  dexterous  shaking  and  whirling  motions  of  the  batea 
filled  with  water  and  a  few  handfuls  of  gravel,  the  lighter  gravel 


Ue'.ports'  Hope,  Vaal  River  Diggings. 

was  carried  to  the  rim  and  washed  or  scraped  away,  and  dia- 
monds mixed  with  heavier  pebbles  were  collected  in  the  hol- 
lowed centre  of  the  dish.  A  gentle  tilt  of  the  batea  drained  off 
the  water,  and  the  precious  stones  were  picked  from  the  other 
pebbles  by  hand. 

Sometimes  the  formacao  was  deposited  in  an  inclined  mov- 
able trough  or  cradle  on  whose  face  fifteen  to  eighteen  pounds 
were  spread  out  at  a  time.  Then  a  carefully  regulated  stream 
of  water  was  allowed  to  run  through  this  deposit  into  a  lower 
trough  and  gutter  while  the  cradle  was  rocked  continually. 
When  the  water  ran  off  clear  from  the  lower  trough,  the  work- 
ing negro  would  pick  out  the  stones  in  the  cradle  with  his  fin- 
gers, until  only  the  finest  pebbles  remained,  which  he  scraped 
over  and  examined  with  the  closest  attention  to  detect  the  pos- 
sible presence  of  diamond  crystals.1 

1  "A  Treatise  on  Gems,"  Feuchtwanger,  1867.  Report  of  United  States 
Minister  to  Brazil,  March,  1899. 


THE    CAMPS    ON   THE   VAAL 


This  was  a  slow  and  tedious  process,  at  best.  The  percent- 
age of  precious  stones  won  from  the  gravel  necessarily  depended 
on  the  care,  expertness,  and  eyesight  of  the  workers.  Experi- 
ence proved  that  fairly  expert  gold  placer  miners  were  not 
equally  competent  in  handling  diamond-bearing  gravel,  and  slave 
labor  was  not  diligent  or  trustworthy.  The  loss  was  increased 
by  the  greedy  pressure  for  big  and  quick  returns,  and  the  pre- 
mium set  on  the  extraction  of  large  stones. 

When,  in  the  course  of  mining,  streams  were  diverted  from 
their  beds  by  dams  and  sluiceways,  there  was  urgent  need  of 
hurrying,  for  the  frail  dams  could  not  bear  the  rush  of  a  flood 
in  the  rainy  season,  and  it  was  necessary  to  remove  the  gravel 
from  the  stretches  of  river  beds  before  the  heavy  rains  fell. 


"•••  -      .«y-.-T>*  .*,  <•••;     •  *,     ,' ^5^^'^^S?,i4^  •  ^•MBJL'  ™  - 

.«.  ..-?  "        tM-V-        '".      **  \'"  >••'  ?'^^»^'  "^ V- 

"*          <  '*    "-/->•"  ,c,%.  t> 


Diggers'  Camps  on  the  Vaal  River. 

Often  the  formacao  was  buried  under  thirty  feet  or  more  of 
sand,  and  all  this  overlying  mass  had  to  be  scooped  up  and 
carried  off  as  well  as  the  layer  of  gravel.  As  the  slaves  had 
nothing  better  than  pans  for  this  work,  the  beds  were  covered 
with  swarms  of  negroes  bearing  pans  on  their  heads  and  nibbling 
away  at  the  ground  like  ants  in  the  effort  to  reach  the  gravel 
before  the  floods  came.  In  the  reckless  haste  many  tracts  of 


144      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

diamond-bearing  gravel  were  buried  under  ground  too  deep  for 
profitable  working,  or  covered  by  the  waste  of  flooded  rivers. 

As  the  mines  advanced  up  the  hillsides,  following  the  course 
of  the  mountain  streams,  it  was  seen  that  there  were  gupiaras  or 
deposits  of  diamond-bearing  gravel  along  the  steep  slopes  of  the 
ravines,  and  these  were  worked  by  carrying  the  gravel  to  the 
banks  of  streams,  or  by  cutting  sluiceways  to  the  deposits. 
Finally,  on  the  sierran  ridges  and  plateaus  the  conglomerate  beds 
were  reached,  from  which  the  deposits  in  the  river  beds  had 
been  washed  by  the  mountain  streams.  This  conglomerate  was 
chiefly  itacolumite,  a  micaceous  sandstone,  accompanied  by 
mica-schist  and  penetrated  irregularly  by  quartz  veins.  This 
was  the  prevailing  composite  in  the  Serro  de  San  Antonio,  in 
which  the  Jequetinhonha  rises  in  the  Serro  de  Matta  de  Corda, 
the  fountain  head  of  the  Rio  Francisco. 

Here  the  diamonds  were  not  as  thickly  sprinkled  as  they 
were  in  the  cascalho  concentrate,  but  the  quantity  was  sufficient 
to  make  extraction  profitable,  if  the  conglomerate  could  be  dis- 
integrated and  washed.  This  was  effected  by  collecting  rain 
water  in  pools  at  points  above  the  conglomerate  and  carrying 
down  the  water  through  ditches  into  gullies  cut  in  the  beds. 
By  the  flow  of  the  water,  the  formacao  was  separated  from  the 
mass  of  rocks  and  sand.  This  device  worked  well,  but  owing 
to  the  scarcity  of  water,  the  washing  could  only  be  continued  for 
a  few  weeks,  at  most,  in  the  course  of  a  year.  In  1832  mining 
in  these  fields  was  opened  to  the  public,  but  the  most  accessible 
and  prolific  beds  had  been  worked,  and  there  was  little  apparent 
encouragement  for  the  investment  of  capital  in  any  large  under- 
taking which  might  have  advanced  the  science  of  diamond 
winning.  It  is  said  that  more  than  half  of  the  diamonds  pro- 
duced in  Brazil  were  stolen  by  the  workmen  and  sold  to  contra- 
band dealers,  by  whom  they  were  secretly  sent  out  of  the  country. 

Outside  of  the  Indian  and  Brazilian  fields  no  considerable 
source  of  supply  had  been  discovered  anywhere.  Some  dia- 
mond-bearing ground  had  been  found  in  Borneo,  which  yielded 
for  many  years  a  dribbling  return,  and  in  1829  the  first-known 


THE    CAMPS    ON   THE   VAAL  145 

diamond  of  Russia  was  discovered  on  the  west  flank  of  the  Ural 
Mountains  by  Humboldt  and  Rose,  in  a  gold  placer  field  near 
the  iron  mines  of  Bissersk.  Here  the  prevailing  rock  forma- 
tion, like  that  in  the  upper  diamond  fields  of  Brazil,  was  itacolu- 
mite,  with  an  admixture  of  mica  and  iron  pyrites.1  The  debris 
washed  into  a  few  valleys  beneath  this  range  yielded  a  meagre 
return  to  the  searchers,  but  there  was  nothing  to  inspire  any 
ardent  working,  and  in  Bohemia,  Australia,  Mexico,  and  the 
United  States,  the  picking  up  of  a  few  isolated  specimens  was 
noted  as  a  curious  occurrence  rather  than  as  the  foundation  of 
any  hope  of  a  productive  diamond  field.2 

So,  at  the  time  of  the  discoveries  of  diamonds  on  the  banks 
of  the  Vaal  River,  there  was  no  known  method  for  the  extraction 
of  diamonds  beyond  the  shovel  of  the  Indian,  the  batea  of  the 
Brazilian,  or  the  cradle  of  the  gold  miner.  There  was  no  antici- 
pation, on  the  part  of  the  diamond  seekers,  of  any  formation  in 
Africa  except  the  diamond-bearing  gravel  of  alluvial  deposits, 
and  the  prospectors  of  the  first  rush  did  not  seek  for  diamonds 
beyond  the  gravel  along  the  banks  of  the  Vaal. 

The  Early  Mining  at  Klip-drift,  now  called  Barkly  West. 

The  first  waves  of  the  influx  from  the  southern  country  and 
coast  towns  were  warmly  greeted  by  the  small  parties  at  work 
on  the  Vaal.  The  diggers  were  squatters,  without  any  legal 
title  to  an  inch  of  the  river  bank,  as  they  very  well  knew.  But 
they  relied  on  actual  possession  without  contest,  for  their  rocky 
field  was  so  apparently  worthless  that  no  farmer  had  cared  to 
secure  it.  They  did  not  trouble  their  heads  with  any  question- 
ing whether  the  South  African  Republic  covered  their  shore 
line,  or  whether  any  native  tribe  laid  claim  to  it,  but  they  were 

1  "A  Treatise  on  Gems,"  Feuchtwanger,  1867.     "Notices  sur  les  Diamants 
de  1'Oural,"  Parrot.        "Transactions  of  the  Imperial  Russian  Mineralogical  Soci- 
ety," at  St.  Petersburg,  1842.      "  De  Novis  quibusdam  Fossilibus  quae  in  mon- 
tibus  Uraliis  inveniuntur,"  Gustav  Rose,  1839. 

2  «<  Gems  and  Precious  Stones  of  North  America,"  Kunz,   1890. 


146      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OE   SOUTH    AFRICA 

so  weak  in  numbers  that  they  had  some  fear  of  possible  attack 
from  the  neighboring  Koranas  and  Griquas,  or  other  natives 
who  might  covet  their  oxen  and  arms  and  supplies,  as  well  as 
their  hard-won  gems.1  In  view  of  the  abject  state  of  the  few 
surviving  Hottentots  on  the  Vaal,  any  dread  of  their  hostility 
seemed  absurd,  but  the  miners  did  not  know  how  weak  the 
natives  were,  and  their  new-found  treasure  unsteadied  their 
nerves.  So  they  were  glad  to  see  a  rally  of  prospectors  on  the 
fields  large  enough  to  scare  off  any  menacing  natives. 

The  early  comers  picked  out  irregular  patches  of  ground 
here  and  there,  to  suit  their  fancy,  and  dug  and  strayed  along 
the  river  banks  as  they  pleased,  prospecting  on  any  unoccupied 
spot.  There  was  no  precise  limit  to  the  size  of  any  claim.  One 
party  would  pounce  on  a  whole  hillock,  like  the  prolific  "  Natal 
kopje,"  and  another  would  occupy  a  hundred  feet  or  more  of 
shore  line.  There  was  no  apparent  need  of  jostling  one  another, 
when  any  square  rod  for  miles  along  a  river  bank  was  as  thickly 
sprinkled  with  diamonds  as  another,  so  far  as  any  of  the  pro- 
spectors could  judge.  Still,  the  known  yield  of  the  Natal  kopje 
drew  preference  to  locations  around  it,  and  the  product  of  other 
neighboring  placers  was  so  enticing  that  the  mass  of  diggers 
concentrated  at  Klip-drift. 

This  massing  made  it  necessary  to  agree  on  some  defined 
limits  of  ground  which  a  man  could  reserve  for  his  own  work- 
ing, or  combine  with  the  sections  assigned  to  companions.  To 
fix  and  make  this  assignment  a  "Diggers'  Committee"  was 
chosen  by  an  informal  mass  meeting  of  the  prospectors,  which 
made  simple  regulations  controlling  the  working  of  the  river 
diggings.  It  was  agreed  that  the  size  of  a  location  should  be 
thirty  feet  square,  and  that  title  should  be  conveyed  by  a  certificate 
from  the  supervising  committee.  The  water's  edge  along  the 
river  was  open  to  anybody  wherever  it  was  possible  to  set  a 
trough  or  a  miner's  cradle  without  interfering  with  other  ground- 
washing  fixtures  already  in  place,  but  locations  might  begin  a  few 
yards  from  the  river.2  So  there  was  soon  a  close-set  fringe  of 
1  "Among  the  Diamonds,"  1870-1871,  John  Noble.  2  Ibid. 


THE    CAMPS    ON   THE   VAAL  147 

cradles  and  water-troughs  at  the  bottom  of  the  Klip-drift  bank, 
and  the  ridged  and  gullied  slope  for  hundreds  of  yards  inland 
was  pitted  with  holes  from  ten  to  thirty  feet  square,  and  ranging 
in  depth  from  four  to  twenty-five  feet.  If  the  river  shore  in 
line  with  the  parallel  claim  was  too  thick  set  with  cradles  to 
admit  a  new  washing  machine,  or  if  the  claim  was  high  up  on 
the  bank,  water  for  washing  was  sometimes  carried  up  from  the 
river  in  carts  to  the  working  ground.  Alluvial  soil  covered  the 
face  of  the  basin,  more  or  less  thickly,  for  a  stretch  of  half  a 
mile  from  the  river,  lying  even  on  the  tops  of  the  kopjes,  except 


River  Diggings  at  Gong  Gong,  1880. 

where  rugged  boulders  and  blocks  of  basalt  and  trap  protruded 
stiffly  above  the  coating  of  gravel. 

The  choice  of  location  was  largely  determined  by  fancy, 
rather  than  any  solid  reason.  Some  preferred  light  colored 
patches  of  gravel  to  dark,  but  would  have  been  puzzled  by  any 
call  to  justify  their  choice.  Others  sought  for  tops  of  kopjes, 
with  a  supposition  that  the  rains  had  washed  the  light  gravel 
downhill  and  left  the  heavier  deposit  with  the  diamonds  on  the 
crown  of  the  hillocks  and  ridges.1  It  was  generally  observed, 
however,  that  diamond  crystals  were  most  plentiful  in  spots 

1  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Charles  Alfred  Payton,  London, 
1872. 


148      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

where  garnets  and  peridot  were  thickly  deposited  in  the  gravel, 
and  this  observation  was  in  accord  with  current  accounts  of 
mining  in  other  diamond  fields.  So  the  occurrence  of  these 
red  and  green  pebbles  was  commonly  hailed  as  an  assurance  of 
the  presence  of  diamonds,  and  gravel  so  charged  was  washed 
and  sorted  with  exceptional  care.  But  there  was  no  concentrated 
deposit  in  this  field  like  the  cascalho  in  the  Brazilian  river 
valleys,  and  the  labor  of  washing  the  thick  mass  of  loose  gravel 
was  necessarily  great. 

There  were  no  appliances  for  handling  and  concentrating  the 
gravel  marking  any  noticeable  advance  above  the  slow  and  labo- 
rious methods  of  the  Brazilian  and  Indian  placer  workers.  The 
deposit  was  a  mass  of  gravel  and  sand,  thickly  sprinkled  through- 
out with  heavy  boulders  of  basalt  and  melaphyre  which  were 
laboriously  pried  and  dragged  out  of  the  shallow  pits  sunk  by 
the  miners.1  The  mixed  gravel  and  sand  was  shovelled  into 
wheelbarrows  or  carts  and  taken  to  the  river's  edge,  where  it  was 
dumped  into  heaps  on  the  ground,  or  in  troughs  sunk  in  the 
bank.  Then  the  gravel  was  washed  in  cradles,  with  two  or 
three  screens  of  perforated  iron,  or  zinc,  or  wire  mesh,  set  to 
form  partitions  with  discharge  holes  so  graduated  that  the  larger 
stones  were  held  above  the  upper  and  coarser  screen,  while  the 
sand  and  lighter  gravel  flowed  out  through  the  upper  and  lower 
screen  holes.  Meanwhile  the  cradle  was  more  or  less  expertly 
shaken  to  cause  a  deposit  of  the  gravel  of  high  specific  gravity 
on  the  bottom  between  the  screens.  The  worthless  stones  in 
the  upper  part  of  the  cradle  were  then  picked  and  scooped  out 
by  hand  and  thrown  away,  while  the  concentrate  was  taken  out 
carefully  and  carried  to  the  sorting  table,  an  ordinary  deal  stand, 
or  any  level  wooden  or  iron  structure,  or  to  a  flat  stone.  Here 
the  deposit  was  spread  out  thinly  and  sorted  over  inch  by 
inch  with  a  short  scraper  of  hoop  iron,  or  any  other  thin  strip, 
while  the  appearance  of  a  diamond  was  more  or  less  keenly 
watched  for.'2 

1  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Charles  Alfred  Payton,  London, 
1872.  *  Ibid. 


THE    CAMPS    ON    THE   VAAL  149 


Vaal  River  Diggings. 

This  washing  machine  was  practically  the  same  as  the  Aus- 
tralian gold  placer  miner's  cradle,  or  the  American  rocker,  and  it 
had  been  used  for  years  on  the  Brazilian  diamond  fields,  though 
the  screening  of  the  Vaal  was  probably  more  exact.  But  the 
Brazilian  negroes  had  become  far  more  expert  by  long  practice 
and  training  than  the  green  workers  on  the  line  of  the  Vaal,  and 
the  handling  of  the  concentrate  in  their  bateas  was  extraordinarily 
deft.  It  has  been  demonstrated  over  and  over  again  in  placer 
fields  that  inexperienced  washers  cannot  compete  with  trained 
hands  in  concentrating  gold  dust,  and  even  expert  gold  placer 
workers  often  failed  to  handle  diamond-bearing  gravel  efficiently. 
So  it  is  not  surprising  that  many  of  the  awkward  adventurers 
in  the  new  fields  lost  heart  completely  at  their  failure  to  extract 
any  diamond  from  the  masses  of  gravel  which  they  dug  and 
washed  so  laboriously  ;  and  it  is  practically  certain  that  the  per- 
centage of  gems  saved,  at  first,  was  below  the  average  winning 
from  the  Brazilian  sands. 

The  irregularity  of  the  distribution  of  diamonds  in  the  shore 
bed  was  greatly  perplexing  and  disappointing  to  the  groping 
locaters.  The  precious  stones  were  strewed  in  the  gravel  in  a 
scattering  way  that  defied  any  calculation.  Here  and  there  was 
a  rich  patch  of  ground,  while  tracts  all  around  it,  precisely  simi- 
lar in  a  surface  view,  held  only  a  few  small  diamonds  or  were 


1 50       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF    SOUTH    AFRICA 

hopelessly  barren.  Even  in  the  best  placers  there  were  apparent 
freaks  of  deposit  that  sorely  puzzled  the  diggers,  and  almost  pro- 
voked the  belief  in  the  dropping  of  the  gems  by  whimsical  genii 
rather  than  by  the  play  of  natural  agencies.  One  man,  working 
side  by  side  with  another  for  weeks  in  adjoining  claims,  would 
not  find  one  precious  stone,  while  his  neighbor  was  adding  daily 
to  his  little  sparkling  heap.  Even  when  claims  were  so  split  up 
that  a  digger  could  hardly  turn  about  without  brushing  against 
a  comrade  there  was  the  like  insolvable  contrast  of  gem-studded 
gravel  and  worthless  pebbles.  Often,  too,  when  a  claim  had 
been  abandoned  by  an  unlucky  miner,  the  next  man  who  jumped 
into  the  deserted  hole  would  unearth  in  a  dav  a  superb  diamond, 
and,  perhaps,  wash  out  in.  a  week  y  scors  more  o>  precious 
stones/1 

The  miners  were,  as  a  body,  so  orderly,  so  tenacious  of  their 
own  rights  under  the  established  regulations,  and  so  prudent  in 
restricting  the  possible  extent  of  monopolized  ground,  that  there 
was  little  "claim  jumping"  or  bitter  wrangling.  The  provision 
against  loafing  or  the  holding  of  unworked  claims  on  speculation 
was  sufficiently  sharp.  The  neglect  to  work  a  claim  for  three 
days  consecutively  forfeited  the  holder's  license,  and  the  ground 
was  then  open  for  the  issue  of  a  new  certificate  to  the  first  claim- 
ant. For  many  months  all  unoccupied  ground  in  the  Klip-drift 
camp  was  greedily  pounced  upon  by  newcomers  to  the  fields. 
So  this  part  of  the  river  basin  was  continuously  covered  with  a 
busy  swarm  of  workers,  digging,  washing,  sorting,  driving  carts, 
and  stirring  in  all  the  daily  occupations  of  camp  life.  Where 
one  man  lost  heart  and  went  off  prospecting  up  or  down  the 
river,  or  plodded  wearily  homewards,  another  was  ready  to  take 
his  place  in  a  moment  and  continue  the  unflagging  round  of 
work. 

It  was  soon  perceived  that  such  diamond  placer  digging 
was  inevitably  a  gambling  speculation,  and  few  complained 
loudly  of  their  hard  luck,  or  bitterly  grudged  the  success  of 
their  neighbors.  When  an  unusually  large  stone  was  found, 

1  "Among  the  Diamonds,"   1870—1871,  John  Noble. 


THE   CAMPS    ON   THE   VAAL  151 

there  was  commonly  a  shout  and  a  rallying  of  exultant  friends 
around  the  lucky  finder,  and  all  through  the  fields  a  redoubled 
fervor  of  work  from  the  spur  of  the  signal  success.  Every  one 
felt  that  the  good  fortune  of  a  comrade  might  be  his  own  the 
next  moment,  and, if  this  hope  was  cast  down,  the  diggers  toiled 
on  with  indomitable  pluck  and  sanguine  spirit,  ever  lifting  the 
glittering  image  of  better  luck  some  day.  So  the  rasping  of 
shovels,  the  splashing  of  gravel,  the  rumbling  of  carts,  the 
dumping  of  loads,  and  the  rattle  of  cradles  went  on  incessantly 
with  a  lively  din  from  morning  till  night. 


River  Diggings.     Waldek's  Plant. 

For  the  sorting  of  the  concentrated  gravel  shady  spots  were 
chosen  beneath  spreading  tree-branches,  where  tables  were  set, 
or  under  the  cover  of  canvas  screens  stretched  over  posts. 
Here  the  miners  bent  over  the  thin  layer  of  gravel,  scraping 
along  the  pebbles  bit  by  bit,  and  gluing  their  eyes  to  the  sliding 
stones  in  anxious  search  for  the  coveted  tiny  white  crystals ;  or 
stretched  out  at  full  length  on  their  stomachs,  they  scraped  the 
gravel  over  the  face  of  the  boards  or  iron  sheets  laid  flat  on  the 
ground.  In  this  branch  of  diamond  winning,  where  keen  eyes 
were  essential,  the  native  blacks  were  largely  employed,  some- 
times under  close  watch  of  a  white  overseer,  and  sometimes 
without  any  oversight.  Part  of  the  black  sorters  were  strictly 


1 52      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


Pniel  Diggings,  Vaal  River. 

faithful  and  honest,  as  was  shown  by  test  after  test.  One 
boy  brought  straight  to  his  master  a  diamond  of  eighty  carats, 
which  his  quick  eye  detected  in  the  roots  of  an  old  stump  that 
he  had  been  told  to  dump  into  the  river.  Another  returned  the 
counterfeit  stones  that  his  employer  had  purposely  dropped  in 
the  concentrate.1  But  all  were  not  equally  trustworthy,  and 
many  fine  stones  were  filched  from  the  tables  by  nimble-fingered 
sorters,  even  under  the  eye  of  a  wary  overseer.  When  the  Boer 
farmers  came  to  the  fields,  they  often  brought  their  families  with 
them,  and  it  was  a  common  sight  to  see  father  and  sons  digging 
and  washing,  while  the  mother  and  daughters  sat  on  the  ground 
industriously  picking  over  a  layer  of  pebbles.  Sometimes,  too 


Klip-drift,  Early  River  Diggings. 

1  "Among  the  Diamonds,"  1870-1871,  John  Noble.      "  The  Diamond  Dig- 
gings of  South  Africa,"  Payton,  1872. 


THE    CAMPS    ON   THE   VAAL 


'53 


the  wives  and  sisters  of  English  miners,  even  women  who  had 
rarely  soiled  their  white  hands  before,  might  be  seen  sorting 
river  gravel  as  ardently  as  any  prospector  on  the  line  of  the 
Vaal. 

When  newcomers  roamed  about  sight-seeing  over  the  fields, 
they  were  surprised  to  note  how  rarely  their  presence  drew  even 
a  fleeting  glance.  Scarcely  any  one  of  all  the  groping  swarm  of 
diggers,  washers,  and  sorters,  white  or  black,  men  or  women, 
diverted  an  eye  for  a  moment  from  the  intent  absorption  of  the 
search  for  the  tiny  crystals  embedded  in  the  vast  stretches  of 
gravel.  Eternal  vigilance  is  the  watchword  of  diamond  winning 
as  well  as  of  liber- 
ty. It  was  keenly 
felt  by  the  dia- 
mond seekers  that 
a  fortune  might 
slip  through  their 
hands  in  the  shift- 
ing and  twinkling 
of  an  eye.  So  wan- 
dering strangers 
threaded  their 
way  among  the 
burrows  in  the 
pitted  bank  and  the  diamond  sorting  tables  without  attracting  any 
more  attention  than  stray  pebbles  rolling  down  the  gravel  heap.1 

Whenever  any  one  of  this  curious  swarm  found  a  big  stone 
he  had  a  prize  in  his  hands,  for  the  precious  crystals  of  the 
Vaal  river  beds  are  exceptionally  good  and  free  from  fractures. 
There  were  few  stones  ranging  over  thirty  carats,  but  ten  carat 
stones  were  not  uncommon,  and  even  the  tiniest  stones  of  one 
carat  or  less  were  usually  well  shaped.  Some  were  lightly  tinged 
with  yellow,  detracting  somewhat  from  their  market  value,  but 
there  was  a  large  percentage  of  stones  perfectly  white,  or  so  nearly 

1  "Among  the  Diamonds,"  1870-1871.  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South 
Africa,"  Payton,  1872. 


154       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

colorless  as  to  defy  any  scrutiny  except  that  of  experts.  Deep 
orange  yellow  stones  were  occasionally  found,  and  shades  of 
yellow  grading  to  the  finest  straw  color  were  represented  as  well 
as  pale  blue,  brown,  and  pink,  and  other  hues;  but  any  color 
except  white  or  yellow  was  rarely  to  be  seen.  The  commonest 
crystalline  form  was  the  octahedron,  but  perfect  dodecahedrons 
were  not  unusual,  and  twin  stones  or  a  conglomeration  of  crys- 
tals sometimes  appeared.  There  was  no  adhering  film  or  enve- 
lope such  as  commonly  dulls  the  lustre  of  the  Brazilian  diamond 
crystals.  The  stones  of  the  Vaal  are  clear  and  bright.1 

Digging  for  diamonds  never  becomes  dull  drudgery,  for  there 
is  always  the  glittering  possibility  in  the  mind's  eye  of  upheaving 
a  king's  ransom  with  the  turn  of  a  shovel,  and  it  is  far  more 
exciting  to  a  novice  than  mining  for  gold  or  any  other  minerals. 
But  the  diggers  on  the  Vaal  River  fields  soon  learned  that  the 
actual  disclosure  of  a  diamond  on  the  face  of  the  gravel  which 
he  was  shovelling  was  a  very  rare  occurrence,  for  only  the  largest 
stones  were  likely  to  be  seen  in  a  mass  of  earth  and  pebbles,  and 
few  even  of  these  were  actually  detected  in  the  sinking  of  the 
pits  on  the  river  banks.  So  the  miners  were  rarely  so  absorbed 
in  their  search  that  they  worked  without  stopping  to  eat,  but 
they  clung  to  the  last  gleams  of  the  sun  as  the  miners  have  done 
in  the  rich  gold  pocket  placers  of  America  and  Australia.  The 
diggers  and  washers  went  to  work  usually  at  the  same  hour, 
about  sunrise,  took  an  hour  off  for  breakfast,  and  for  dinner  or 
lunch,  and  stopped  work  when  the  sun  went  down.  In  the 
hotter  weeks  of  the  African  summer  season  (the  summer  — 
November,  December,  January,  and  February  —  is  the  hot  as 
well  as  the  wet  season)  they  did  little  or  no  work  in  the  midday, 
and  when  heavy  rain  and  hail  storms  swept  over  the  fields,  all 
sought  for  cover. 

1  "  South  African  Diamond  Fields  and  Journey  to  Mines,"  William  Jacob 
Morton,  New  York,  1877.  "  The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton, 
1872.  "Diamonds  and  Gold  of  South  Africa,"  Mitchell,  1888.  "To  the 
Cape  for  Diamonds,"  Frederic  Boyle,  London,  1873.  "Diamond  Fields  of  South 
Africa,  by  One  who  has  visited  the  Fields,"  New  York,  1872. 


THE    CAMPS    ON   THE   VAAL 


155 


Camping  on  the  banks  of  the  Vaal  was  rarely  unpleasant  to 
any  one  accustomed  to  a  life  in  the  open  country,  and  even  the 
townsmen  found  little  to  grumble  about.  As  soon  as  they 
reached  the  Diamond  Fields,  the  prospectors  looked  about  for 
good  spots  on  which  to  lodge  their  wagons  and  pitch  their  tents. 
Some  took  to  the  fields  small  circular  or  "  bell "  tents,  but  the 
greater  part  preferred  a  square  or  oblong  "wall"  tent,  commonly 
ten  feet  long  and  eight  wide.  From  a  central  ridgepole, 
propped  at  each  end,  the  canvas  roof  was  stretched  to  side  posts 
four  feet  high,  from  which  flaps  hung  to  the  ground.  This 
shelter  served  as  a  home  for  two  or  three  men,  and  a  storehouse 
for  their  stinted  outfit.  It  was  not  spacious,  but  even  a  little 
tent  was  a  welcome  change  from  the  cramped  bunking  in  mass 
under  a  wagon  cover,  and  the  airy,  clean,  canvas  chamber  was 


Washing  Diamond  Gravel  by  Machinery  at  Gong  Gong,  1880. 

much  pleasanter  than  the  ordinary  farmer's  sleeping  room,  as 
many  of  the  prospectors  remarked  from  experience.  Even  when 
the  campers  were  obliged,  for  lack  of  tents,  to  sleep  in  their 
wagons,  the  big  arched  wagon  did  not  suffer  by  comparison  with 
any  Boer's  hut  on  the  veld.  The  tents  were  pitched,  sometimes 
under  the  cover  of  the  larger  trees  lining  the  river  bank,  and 
sometimes  on  sheltered  slopes,  but  the  mass  at  Klip-drift  were 
bare  to  the  sun,  and  exposed  to  the  blast  of  every  storm  that 
tore  through  the  valley. 

Often  these  storms  were  terrific,  opening  with  the  rising  of  a 


156      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

yellow  streak  above  the  horizon,  and  the  rapid  spreading  over 
the   blue   sky  dome   of  rolling   masses   of  heavy,  lurid   clouds. 


Lightning  at  Kimberley. 


Then  from  the  coppery  bosom  of  this  pall  there  came  such  blaz- 
ing streams  of  lightning  in  sheets  and  contorted  shafts,  such 
rending  explosions  of  thunder  peals,  that  the  awful  flare  and 
crash  would  shake  the  nerves  of  hardened  men.  With  this 


Day  View,  Same  Scene. 


appalling   discharge   there   poured  from   the  clouds  torrents  of 
rain,  or  a  volley  of  huge  hailstones  rattling  on  the  canvas  roofs 


THE    CAMPS    ON   THE   VAAL  157 

and  driving  man  and  beast  to  the  nearest  shelter.1  As  a  safe- 
guard from  these  electric  bolts  the  miners  commonly  put  iron 
lightning  rods  alongside  of  their  tent  poles  and  insulated  them 
with  the  necks  of  glass  bottles,  but  the  insecurity  of  this  shield 
was  evident  in  the  occasional  shattering  of  a  tent  and  the  killing 
or  maiming  of  its  occupants.2 

Except  for  these  storms  the  climate  of  the  Vaal  valley  was 
generally  agreeable.  The  winter  days  were  particularly  pleasant, 
for  the  sun  soon  warmed  the  air  even  when  the  nights  were  so 

o 

cold  that  ice  formed  on  the  face  of  water-troughs.  In  midsum- 
mer the  days  were  often  exceedingly  hot,  the  mercury  rising  as 
high  as  100  Fah.  in  the  shade;  but  the  dry  air  was  not  nearly 
as  enervating  as  the  humid  atmosphere  of  summer  days  in 
Europe  or  America,  and  the  lightly  clothed  miners,  avoiding  the 
midday  glare,  suffered  little.  There  was  a  notable  exemption 
from  sickness  throughout  the  year,  except  for  diarrhcea  and 
dysentery,  and  fever  contracted  in  summer  chiefly  from  the  reck- 
less use  of  unboiled  and  unfiltered  river  water.3 

Plain  food  of  some  kind  was  plentiful  and  cheap,  especially 
maize  meal,  commonly  called  mealie  meal,  and  mutton  and  game 
were  brought  into  the  camp  from  the  neighboring  Transvaal  and 
Free  State  farming  and  pasture  lands.  There  were  many  wild 
fowls,  too,  that  flocked  to  the  valley  of  the  Vaal,  and  several 
kinds  of  food  fish  abounded  in  the  river,  especially  one  resem- 
bling the  voracious  English  barbel,  or  the  catfish  of  America,  and 
the  one  which  the  miners  called  "  yellow  fish."  The  chief  lack 
in  the  food  supply  was  cheap  and  wholesome  vegetables  —  for 
the  dearth  of  these  and  the  excess  of  meat  caused  a  mild  form  of 
scurvy  to  appear  in  the  camp.  Fuel  for  cooking  was  readily  cut 
from  the  trees  along  the  river  bank  or  from  the  thickets  in  the 
ravines.4 

When  the  choice  locations  on  the  Klip-drift  bank  were  taken, 
the  influx,  continuously  moving  to  the  new  Diamond  Fields  from 
the  coast,  spread  up  and  down  the  river,  and  little  camps  sprang 

1  The  Diamond  News,  Klip-drift,  Nov.  4,  1871.  3  Ibid. 

2  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,  1872.  •*  Ibid. 


158      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

up  at  Gong  Gong,  Union  Kopje,  Delport's  Hope,  Forlorn  Hope, 
Niekerk's  Rush,  Blue  Jacket,  Waldek's  Plant,  Larkin's  Flat, 
and  other  placer  diggings,  extending  from  Hebron  twenty  miles 
northeast  of  Klip-drift  to  Sefonell's,  sixty  miles  west.1  It  has 
been  estimated  that  ten  thousand  diggers,  white  and  black,  were 
stretched  along  the  river  in  this  string  of  camps,  and  in  roving 
parties  of  prospectors.2  Any  possible  reckoning  of  the  extent 
of  a  rush  of  thousands,  which  nobody  could  measure  exactly  or 
tried  to  measure,  was  of  course  a  rough  guess,  but  it  seems  prob- 
able that  this  guess  was  not  very  far  from  the  fact.  Such  an 
influx  of  restless  adventurers,  pouring  along  a  river  line  in  a 

thinly  peopled  territory  in  the  heart 
of  South  Africa,  as  heedless  as  a 
locust  swarm  of  any  questions  of 
state  sovereignty,  or  native  tribal 
reservations,  or  mineral  right  titles, 
was  certain  to  raise  a  rumpus,  if 
any  official  authority  in  South  Africa 
undertook  to  drive  them  away,  or 
exact  heavy  license  fees,  or  even  to 
hold  them  down  under  strict  laws 

The  Largest  River  Diamond  ever  found          •  i  r  j          T>L         \ 

in  south  Africa.   Weight,  33o|  Car-      rigorously   enforced.      The  Austra- 

ats;  Value,  £3,500;  Full  Size.  jian    gojd   falfe    fad    furnished   SOmC 

highly  significant  object  lessons  enforcing  this  certainty,  but  the 
little  Boer  Republics  were  not  disposed  to  learn  any  lesson 
from  the  experience  of  English  Colonies. 

The  South  African  Republic  claimed  the  diamond  placer  bor- 
der north  and  west  of  the  Vaal  as  part  of  its  territory,  but  it  was 
content,  at  first,  with  the  bare  assumption  that  the  diggers  on 
the  northern  and  western  bank  were  within  the  confines  of  its 
domain,  without  caring  to  assert  its  right  of  control  by  any 
marked  interference  with  the  free  proceedings  of  the  diggers. 
It  did  not  regard  the  upturning  of  gravel  on  its  border  line  as 
any  menace  of  serious  intrusion  within  its  territory,  and  the 

1  "Among  the  Diamonds,"   1870-1871. 

2  "  South  African  Diamond  Fields,"  Morton,  1877. 


THE    CAMPS   ON   THE    VAAL  159 

neighboring  Boer  farmers  were  generally  well  pleased  with  the 
opening  of  ready  markets  for  their  produce.  Representatives 
of  the  Republic  were  recognized  as  officers  of  the  law  at  Hebron, 
but  there  was  little  attempt  to  impress  any  recognition  of  its 
authority  on  the  camps  farther  down  the  Vaal.1 

So  the  miners  at  Klip-drift  went  on  digging  and  scraping  the 
gravel,  under  their  own  simple  regulations,  month  after  month, 
until  their  busy  camp  burst  suddenly  into  an  uproar,  when  the 
news  came  in  that  President  Pretorius  and  the  Executive  Coun- 
cil of  the  Transvaal  Republic  had  granted  to  a  firm  of  three  privi- 
leged persons  the  exclusive  right  to  search  for  diamonds  in  the 
territory  of  the  Republic  for  a  term  of  twenty  years  from  June  22, 
1870,  subject  to  a  royalty  of  six  per  cent  upon  the  value  of  all 
diamonds  discovered.'2  There  were  some  old  Australian  placer 
miners  on  the  Vaal  River  Diamond  Fields,  and  they  doubtless 
grinned  at  the  thought  of  the  reception  that  such  a  proclamation 
would  have  met  with  at  Bendigo  and  Ballarat;  but  it  was  not 
necessary  for  an  adventurer  to  have  had  a  rearing  on  any  gold 
placer  field  to  fire  his  spirit  to  revolt  against  an  edict  of  dispos- 
session and  monopoly.  It  is  idle  to  debate  the  question  of  the 
technical  legal  right  of  the  administration  of  the  South  African 
Republic  to  make  this  grant.  This  may  be  conceded  without 
affecting  the  countering  facts  of  its  gross  partiality,  inexpediency, 
and  practical  futility.  The  whole  regular  army  of  the  United 
States  would  have  been  too  small  to  enforce  any  such  disposition  of 
its  mineral  lands  after  they  had  been  occupied  without  protest  for 
more  than  six  months  by  squatting  placer  miners,  and  bare  com- 
mon sense  would  have  sufficed  to  inform  the  administration  of 
the  little  South  African  Republic  that  it  could  not  give  effect  to 
its  paper  monopoly  without  a  succession  of  fights  that  would  add 
another  "  Blood  River  "  to  the  face  of  South  Africa. 

The  instant  effect  of  the  grant  was  a  universal  uprising  and 
mass  meeting  of  the  Klip-drift  camp,  and  the  declaration  of  the 
foundation  of  another  free  and  independent  Republic  on  the  Vaal, 

1  "  Among  the  Diamonds,"  1870-1871. 

2  "South  Africa,"  George  McCall  Theal,  1888-1893. 


160       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

of  which  Stafford  Parker,  one  of  the  leading  adventurers,  was 
chosen  president.1  This  was,  on  its  face,  a  proceeding  that 
smacked  of  opera  bouffe,  but,  like  Janus,  it  had  another  face. 
It  was  a  flaunt  of  determination  to  cut  off  every  shred  of  political 
connection  with  the  South  African  Republic,  and  hold  possession 
of  a  slice  of  rich  mining  land  with  a  Colony  which,  at  some  future 
time,  if  not  immediately,  Great  Britain  might  be  disposed  to 
welcome  and  incorporate  with  her  imperial  cluster  on  the  coast. 
If  this  hope  was  not  openly  avowed  at  first,  it  undoubtedly  ex- 
isted in  the  minds  of  many  of  the  diggers,  and  no  time  was  lost 
in  communicating  the  situation  to  her  Majesty's  High  Com- 
missioner at  the  Cape,  Lieutenant  General  Hay. 

It  is,  however,  unlikely  that  there  was  any  confident  expecta- 
tion of  the  endurance  of  the  new  Republic  founded  on  a  gravel 
bank  whose  precious  contents  were  fast  fleeting,  but  the  organi- 
zation was  set  up  as  a  handy  resort,  on  the  spur  of  the  moment, 
to  make  an  imposing  show  of  resistance  to  the  authority  of  the 
South  African  Republic,  and  with  the  idea  of  shunning  the  pen- 
alty of  forcibly  contesting  the  execution  of  the  monopoly  grant 
within  a  recognized  district  of  its  domain.  Whatever  legal 
unsoundness  there  may  have  been  in  the  construction  of  the 
Klip-drift  Republic,  and  in  the  notions  of  its  framers,  the  shaky 
ship  of  state  served  its  main  purpose.  The  administration  of 
the  Transvaal  Republic  realized  their  grave  blunder  too  late, 
and  being  humane  and  peace-loving  men,  refrained  from  any 
attempt  to  maintain  their  grant  or  their  contested  authority  by 
force  of  arms.  But  they  complained  earnestly  to  the  British 
Colonial  authorities  of  the  intrusion  and  illegal  occupation  and 
insubordination  of  the  squatting  adventurers  on  the  Vaal. 

Meanwhile  the  diamond  diggers  did  not  concern  themselves 
with  the  remote  vexation  of  the  Boer  President  and  Council,  but 
kept  on  ransacking  the  gravel.  Early  in  the  year  there  had 
been  some  straggling  prospecting  on  the  Pniel  bank  opposite 
Klip-drift,  but  the  first  continuous  work  on  a  south  bank  placer 

1  "  South  Africa,"  George  McCall  Theal,  1888-1893.  "Among  the 
Diamonds,"  1870—1871. 


THE   CAMPS   ON   THE   VAAL  161 

was  begun  in  June  by  a  party  from  the  Klip-drift  camp.1  Their 
undertaking  was  an  unwelcome  intrusion  on  land  claimed  by  the 
Pniel  Mission,  and  the  diggers  were  warned  of  their  trespassing 
by  the  clergyman  in  charge.  The  Mission  Station  was  several 
miles  from  the  diamond  placer,  and  the  diggers  ignored  the 
notice,  as  they  were  not  interfering  apparently  with  the  mission 
work  by  washing  river  bank  gravel.  The  placer  ground  proved 
so  rich  that  the  diggers  flocked  to  it  rapidly,  and  the  Berlin 
Society  which  maintained  the  missions  at  Pniel  and  Hebron 
was  soon  glad  to  obtain  the  license  fee  which  it  was  generally 
able  to  secure  from  the  diggers  on  the  Pniel  field.  The  pre- 
ferred locations  on  the  Pniel  bank  were  along  a  stretch  in  the 
middle  of  the  rising  ground,  a  few  yards  from  the  water's  edge. 
In  this  tract  diamonds  were  strewn  so  continuously  as  to  suggest 
the  existence  of  a  flow  or  stream  of  them,  in  the  red  drift  gravel 
between  the  boulders,  to  the  eye  of  more  than  one  observer. 
This  strip  was  soon  honeycombed  with  shallow  pits  reaching 
bedrock  about  twenty-five  feet  below  the  surface.2 

The  flow  of  prospectors  continued  to  spread  until  the  Pniel 
camp,  in  a  few  months,  rivalled  Klip-drift  in  size,  and  the  two 
contained  a  population  of  four  or  five  thousand  people.  Small 
stone,  brick,  and  iron  buildings  for  stores  and  other  business 
uses  were  quickly  put  up  in  rows  along  a  main  street  in  the 
heart  of  Klip-drift  camp,  which  bore  the  name  of  Campbell 
Street,  and  a  few  others  of  the  same  durable  materials  rose  from 
other  spots  in  the  fields,  but  most  of  the  miners  continued  to 
live  in  their  canvas  tents,  or  in  reed  huts  plastered  with  clay. 
The  stone  for  building  was  readily  obtained  from  neighboring 
hillsides,  and  was  neatly  cut  and  laid,  so  that  Campbell  Street 
soon  compared  favorably  with  any  country  town  street  in  South 
Africa.  Butchers,  bakers,  and  grocers  opened  shops ;  restau- 
rants offered  good,  plainly  cooked  food  at  charges  so  moderate 
that  it  was  reckoned  that  a  man  could  be  well  fed  at  a  cost  of 
is.  6d.  a  day;  a  tavern  and  lodging-house,  dignified  by  the  name 
of  hotel,  accommodated  travellers  and  regular  boarders;  diamond 

1  "Among  the  Diamonds,"  1870-1871.  2  Ibid. 


162      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


brokers  sat  ready  to  judge  and  buy  rough  diamonds  for  export ; 
a  music  hall  had  a  rude  vaudeville  show  every  week-day  night ; 
members  of  the  Masonic  fraternity  established  a  lodge;  and  a 
little  brick  church  welcomed  all  comers  to  its  Sunday  services.1 
Similar  buildings  were  put  up  less  regularly  in  the  Pniel 
camp  too,  and  both  sides  of 
the  river  showed  the  like  med- 
ley of  iron,  brick,  stone,  light 
wood,  and  canvas  stores  and 
dwellings.  The  first  mining- 
town  newspaper  in  South  Africa, 


Views  of  Klip-drift. 

the  Diamond  News,  was  started  at 
Pniel,  —  a  little  four-page  sheet 
that  was  chiefly  filled  with  adver- 
tisements of  local  tradesmen  on 
both  sides  of  the  river,  and  the  local  news  and  stir  of  the  river 
diggings.  Rowboats  of  an  established  ferry  made  regular  trips 
across  the  river  from  one  camp  ground  to  the  other,  charging  a 
passenger  sixpence  for  crossing.  So  there  was  easy  communi- 
cation, and  the  two  camps  were  one  in  their  common  appearance, 

1  "Among  the  Diamonds,"  1870-1871.      ft  The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South 
Africa,"  Payton,  1872. 


THE    CAMPS    ON   THE   VAAL  163 

work  and  sympathy,  though  the  Pniel  camp  did  not  pretend  to 
the  dignity  of  an  independent  Republic,  but  submitted  meekly 
to  the  payment  of  license  fees  to  the  Berlin  Mission  Society  and 
to  the  assertion  of  the  sovereignty  of  the  Orange  Free  State, 
represented  by  a  local  magistrate,  with  the  adjuncts  of  a  canvas 
jail,  whipping-posts,  and  stocks.1 

Oddly  enough,  in  view  of  the  shallow  gravel  bed  which  was 
the  sole  support  of  these  camps,  the  approach  of  collapse  was 
not  clearly  foreseen.  An  observer  of  more  than  ordinary  intel- 
ligence visited  the  camp  at  the  close  of  the  year  1870,  and  noted 
the  exhaustion  of  the  rich  ridge  gravel  back  of  Campbell  Street, 
where  more  than  two  thousand  diggers  were  at  work  a  few 
months  before.  Yet,  while  remarking  the  drift  of  prospectors 
to  outlying  placers,  he  wrote,  "  Notwithstanding  this,  Klip-drift 
flourishes,  and  together  with  Pniel  will  no  doubt  always  continue 
to  be  a  head  centre  of  the  diamond-digging  community."  For 
this  sanguine  view  there  was  some  justification  in  the  general 
ignorance  of  the  actual  extent  of  the  diamond  beds  in  the  alluvial 
deposit,  and  in  the  common  declaration  of  a  purpose  to  persist 
in  searching  for  diamonds,  even  by  those  whose  hard  luck 
forced  them  to  abandon  the  fields  for  a  time.  "  Hope's  blest 
dominion  never  ends  "  to  the  most  unfortunate  laborer.  This 
visitor  did  not  meet  one  of  the  many  leaving  the  ground  with 
empty  pockets  who  did  not  protest  his  resolution  to  return  to 
the  diggings  in  the  following  March  or  April  after  the  heat  and 
storms  of  the  summer  season  on  the  Vaal  were  past.2  Fortu- 
nately for  these  luckless  adventurers,  there  was  a  new  and  phe- 
nomenal development  of  other  Diamond  Fields,  whose  output 
soon  dwarfed  all  the  returns  from  the  shallow  River  Diggings. 

1  "Among  the  Diamonds,"  1870-1871.      "South  Africa,"  George  McCall 
Theal,  1888-1893. 

2  "  Among  the  Diamonds,"    1870-1871. 


CHAPTER   VI 


THE    RUSH    TO    KIMBERLEY 


HERE  was  a  pretty  green  valley  near  the  Free 
State  settlement  of  Fauresmith,  hardly  a  mile 
in  width,  but  stretching  for  several  miles  to  the 
northeast  through  ridges  of  volcanic  rock  kopjes. 
Fauresmith  lay  in  the  track  of  the  stream  flow- 
ing from  the  coast  ports  to  the  diamond-bearing 
valley  of  the  Vaal,  but  there  was  no  thought  of  a  probable  dia- 
mond field  on  the  plateau  so  far  from  a  river  bed.  So  for 
months  the  adventurers  passed  on  without  pausing,  except  for 
a  night's  camp,  on  their  way  to  the  Vaal.  A  Boer  settler,  Cor- 
nells Johannes  Vistser,  had  taken  up  a  considerable  part  of  the 
neighboring  valley  in  his  farm  of  Jagersfontein,  where  his  house 
stood  in  the  midst  of  a  gay,  blooming  garden.  He  had  died 
before  the  discovery  of  diamonds,  but  his  farm  was  held  by  his 
widow,  Jacoba  Magdalena  Cecilia  Visser,  and  worked  by  an  over- 
seer in  charge. 

A  little  stream,  flowing  from  the  hills,  ran  through  the  valley 
in  the  rainy  season,  though  for  the  greater  part  of  the  year  its 
track  was  only  marked  by  a  spruit  or  dry  water-course.  De 
Klerk,  the  overseer,  noticed  that  many  small  garnets  mixed  with 
pebbles  of  agate  were  sprinkled  along  the  dry  bed  of  this  spruit, 
and  learned  that  the  diggers  on  the  Vaal  believed  garnets  to  be 
an  indication  of  the  presence  of  diamonds.  So  he  began  pros- 
pecting one  day  in  August,  1870,  on  the  line  of  the  spruit,  awk- 
wardly sifting  the  dry  gravel  and  sand  in  a  common  wire  sieve. 
At  the  depth  of  six  feet  he  found  a  fine  diamond  of  fifty  carats, 
and  the  news  of  his  discovery  was  soon  widely  spread  throughout 
the  Free  State.1 

1  "Among  the  Diamonds,"   1870-1871. 
164 


THE   RUSH    TO    KIMBERLEY  165 

His  neighbors  flocked  first  to  the  farm,  and  the  thrifty  widow 
Visser  was  pleased  to  welcome  them,  and  permitted  them  to  dig 
in  her  spruit,  on  allotted  patches  of  twenty  feet  square,  for  which 
each  paid  her  a  license  fee  of  £1  a  month.  The  phlegmatic 
Boers  were  not  wildly  excited  by  the  prospect  of  fortune  hid  in 
the  spruit,  but  diamond  hunting  was  an  agreeable  diversion  from 
dull  farming,  and  they  came  with  their  wives  and  children  in  their 
big  canvas-covered  wagons,  and  spread  out  through  the  green  val- 
ley like  country  folk  at  a  picnic.  The  children  delighted  in  their 
search  for  pretty  pebbles  and  soon  filled  their  pockets  with  gar- 
nets and  agates  ;  but  the  digging  in  the  spruit  was  often  so  labo- 
rious that  the  farmers  were  content  to  squat  on  the  ground  and 
puff  their  long  pipes  while  their  black  servants  did  the  digging 
and  rock  heaving.  When  natives  were  not  engaged  as  diggers, 
the  farmers  and  their  sons  indolently  shovelled  out  the  gravel  in 
heaps  to  be  sorted  by  their  wives  and  children. 

Underneath  the  red  surface  soil  filled  with  pebbles,  there  was 
a  layer  of  calcareous  clay,  varying  in  thickness  from  a  few  feet  to 
twelve  or  more,  covering  drifts  and  pockets  of  gravel  thickly 
sprinkled  with  heavy  boulders  of  greenstone  and  basalt.  It  was 
necessary  to  pry  up  and  tug  out  these  boulders  in  order  to  reach 
the  underlying  gravel,  and  this  task  was  no  child's  play.  Then  the 
gravel  was  pitched  out  of  the  holes,  rudely  sorted  by  dry  sifting 
in  sieves,  and  picked  over  by  hand  in  search  of  the  precious 
stones.  In  some  pockets  there  was  quite  a  sprinkling  of  diamonds, 
garnets  and  peridot,  mixed  with  coarse  gravel,  and  the  returns  far 
exceeded  the  license  charge ;  but  the  diamond  deposit  was  scat- 
tered as  irregularly  as  that  of  the  Vaal  River  field,  and  many  of  the 
workers  toiled  for  weeks  on  their  claims  without  finding  anything 
more  precious  than  the  jawbones  and  teeth  of  a  hyena  or  jackal.1 

Attention  had  hardly  been  called  to  the  diggings  at  Jagers- 
fontein  when  a  still  more  remarkable  discovery  was  made  in  the 
month  of  September,  1870,  at  Dutoitspan,2  on  the  farm  of  Dorst- 

1  "Among  the  Diamonds,"   1870-1871. 

2  The  original  and  correct  form  of  this  name  was  "  Du  Toit's  Pan,"  or  the 
pan  or  pond  of  du  Toit,  the  name  of  the  man  who  first  owned  the  farm.     Both  Du 
Toit's  Pan  and  Dutoitspan  are  now  used. 


166      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

fontein,  about  twenty  miles  southeast  of  Pniel  and  Klip-drift  on 
the  Vaal.  Du  Toit's  pan  was  one  of  the  curious  natural  land 
basins  before  described,  receiving  the  wash  of  the  surrounding 
ridges,  and  holding  pools  of  water  during  the  rainy  season  and 
sometimes  during  the  year.  The  title  to  the  farm  Dorstfontein 
was  granted  by  the  Free  State  Government  to  Abraham  Pauls  du 
Toit  on  the  4th  of  April,  1860.  Du  Toit  sold  the  farm  to 
Adriaan  J.  van  Wyk,  who  had  built  a  little  house  near  the  side 
of  the  "  pan,"  where  he  was  living  indifferent  to  the  rush  of 
prospectors  to  the  Vaal  River,  until  he  was  suddenly  surprised 
by  the  finding  of  diamonds  a  short  distance  from  his  house. 

When  the  news  of  this  discovery  spread,  coming,  as  it  did,  so 
close  upon  the  revelation  at  Jagersfontein,  there  was  an  instant 
rush  of  prospectors  from  the  Vaal  to  the  new  field,  swelled  by 
the  neighboring  farmers  and  the  influx  still  flowing  from  the 
coast  towns.  Van  Wyk  demanded,  at  first,  a  royalty  of  one- 
fourth  of  the  value  of  all  diamonds  found  on  his  farm,  from 
every  prospector  seeking  to  explore  the  new  field ;  but  he  soon 
concluded  to  issue  licenses  at  a  charge  of  js.  6d.  monthly  for 
every  allotted  claim  of  thirty  feet  square.  The  Orange  Free 
State  government  was  aroused  to  assert  its  claim  of  sovereignty 
by  the  spread  of  the  discoveries,  and  attempted  to  restrict  the 
allotment  of  the  claims  on  the  farm  land,  for  the  benefit  of  its 
own  citizens,  by  an  ordinance  prohibiting  the  issuance  of  licenses 
to  any  one  except  a  Free  State  burgher  or  farmer ;  but  this 
requirement  was  easily  evaded  at  Jagersfontein  and  Dutoitspan 
by  the  transfer  of  licenses  granted  to  Free  State  citizens.  Fur- 
thermore, the  spread  of  the  news  of  the  discovery  and  the  result- 
ant rush  to  the  Diamond  Fields  was  soon  beyond  any  possible 
restriction  imposed  by  this  little  Republic.1  Van  Wyk  was  pre- 
vailed upon  without  much  difficulty  to  sell  his  farm  to  the 
predecessors  of  the  London  and  South  African  Exploration 
Company  for  ^2600,  a  fortune  far  surpassing  any  glitter  of 
pebbles  in  the  ground,  in  the  view  of  this  simple  farmer. 

Side  by  side  with  the  Dorstfontein  farm  lay  the  farm  of  Bult- 
1  "South  Africa,"  Theal,  1888-1893. 


THE    RUSH    TO    KIMBERLEY  167 

fontein,  divided  by  a  public  roadway.  The  spread  of  prospect- 
ing soon  passed  naturally  across  the  road  to  Bultfontein  and  to 
other  neighboring  farms.  Bultfontein  was  owned  by  a  poor 
Boer,  Cornelis  Hendrik  du  Plooy,  and  before  the  discovery  at 
Dutoitspan  a  thousand  pounds  would  have  been  thought  a 
grossly  extravagant  price  to  pay  for  the  whole  farm  and  its  live 
stock.  But  the  luck  of  van  Wyk  put  a  new  face  on  the  scrubby 
farm  lands  near  the  Vaal,  and  an  eager  Free  State  speculator, 
Thomas  Lynch,  did  not  wait  over  Sunday  to  buy  Bultfontein, 
but  amazed  the  owner  by  driving  out  to  his  farm  on  the  Lord's 
Day,  November  14,  1869,  and  offering  ^£2000  for  his  land.  Du 
Plooy  accepted  the  offer  on  the  spot,  for  such  a  sum  in  cash  was 
vastly  bigger  in  his  eyes  than  any  possible  return  from  farming 
or  picking  up  "  blink  klippe."  It  is  said  that  diamonds  had 
been  found  on  the  farm  previous  to  this  sale,  but  Du  Plooy  was 
not  aware  of  any  actual  discovery  on  his  land,  and  preferred  cash 
in  hand  to  any  gambling  chances.  The  story  is  told  that  Bult- 
fontein mine  was  discovered  by  the  finding  of  a  diamond  in  the 
mortar  used  by  du  Plooy  to  plaster  his  house  and  the  subsequent 
search  for  diamonds  in  the  pit  from  which  the  sand  had  been 
taken.  It  is  true  that  diamonds  were  found  as  reported,  but  it 
was  some  time  after  the  mine  had  been  rushed.1 

On  the  same  day  that  du  Plooy  sold  his  farm  to  Lynch, 
he  was  beset  by  Leopold  Lilienfeld  and  others,  who  advised 
him  that  the  sale  was  illegal,  being  made  on  a  Sunday,  and 
eventually  Lilienfeld  gave  du  Plooy  an  indemnity  against  all 
damages  if  he  would  refuse  to  conclude  the  sale  to  Lynch. 
On  November  16,  1869,  the  sale  of  the  farm  was  concluded 
between  du  Plooy  and  Leopold  Lilienfeld,  Louis  Hond  and 
Henry  Barlow  Webb  for  the  sum  of  £1000.  Hond  sold  his 
one-third  interest  to  Webb,  who,  with  Lilienfeld,  Edgar  Eager 
Hurley,  and  others,  formed  the  "  Hopetown  Company." 

Lynch  brought  action  against  du  Plooy  for  ^£  10,000  damages, 
and  obtained  a  judgment  for  ^500  and  costs  on  August  19,  1872. 
In  spite  of  his  indemnity  du  Plooy  was  then  obliged  to  sue 
i"  Among  the  Diamonds,"  John  Noble,  1870-1871. 


168       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

Lilienfeld  and  his  associates,  and  obtained  judgment  for  £760 
19-f.  id.  and  costs,  February  12,  1893.  In  1876,  when  the  Land 
Commission  heard  this  case,  the  London  and  South  African  Ex- 
ploration Company  had  been  formed,  and  the  title  to  the  farm 
was  granted  to  that  company,  as  successors  of  the  "  Hopetown 
Company." 

Bultfontein  was  linked  to  Dorstfontein  by  the  acquisition  of 
both  farms  by  one  holder,  and  transferred  in  a  subsequent  sale  to 
investors  associated  as  the  London  and  South  African  Explora- 
tion Company.  The  farm  of  Vooruitzigt,  which  lay  bordering 
on  Dorstfontein  and  Bultfontein  to  the  north,  was  bought  for 
^£6000  shortly  after  by  other  speculative  investors, — -the  firm  of 
Messrs.  Dunell,  Ebden  &  Co.,  of  Port  Elizabeth. 

The  correct  record  of  these  farms  is  as  follows  :  — 

Bultfontein  was  originally  granted  by  the  British  Govern- 
ment (then  occupying  the  Free  State  under  the  name  of  "  The 
Orange  River  Sovereignty")  to  J.  F.  Otto,  December  16,  1848, 
under  Warden  certificate. 

Dorstfontein  was  granted  by  the  Free  State  Government  to 
Abraham  Pauls  du  Toit  on  the  4th  of  April,  1860. 

Alexandersfontein  was  granted  by  the  Free  State  Govern- 
ment to  Johannes  Cornelis  Coetzee  on  the  jd  of  December,  1862. 
That  portion  cut  off  by  the  Free  State  boundary  from  Griqua- 
land  West  was  granted  to  Philip  Rudolph  Nel  and  Willem 
Gabriel  Nel  on  the  i6th  of  January,  1880. 

Vooruitzigt  was  originally  a  portion  of  Bultfontein,  and  was 
sold  to  D.  A.  and  J.  N.  de  Beer  on  the  i8th  of  April,  1860. 

At  the  time  of  these  purchases  the  price  paid  for  any  ground 
outside  of  a  short  stretch  on  the  Dorstfontein  farm  was  wholly 
speculative.  There  had  been  no  considerable  discovery  of  dia- 
monds except  along  the  top  of  a  sloping  ridge  or  long  kopje 
lying  north,  at  a  distance  of  about  a  third  of  a  mile,  from  du 
Toit's  pan.  The  total  area  of  the  three  farms  was  about  fifty- 
eight  and  a  half  (58^)  square  miles.1  The  comparative  ease  of 

1  The  total  area  of  the  farms,  Dorstfontein  (6579  acres),  Bultfontein  (14,457 
acres),  and  Vooruitzigt  (16,405  acres),  is  37,441  acres,  equal  to  58^  square  miles. 


OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY 


OF 


THE    RUSH    TO    KIMBERLEY 


169 


Kimberley,  1872. 

working  in  the  new  fields  was  a  pleasant  surprise  to  the  River 
Diggers,  who  had  been  obliged  to  sink  pits  in  heavy  gravel  thick 
set  with  boulders.  Now  they  found  diamonds  sprinkled  through 
a  light  surface  soil  of  decomposed  yellow  ground,  and  many 
stones  were  so  thinly  covered  with  earth  that  some  little  brilliant 
crystals  were  washed  free  from  sand  after  every  heavy  rain,  and 
lay  shining  on  the  ground,  to  be  picked  up  by  sharp-eyed  dia- 
mond seekers.1  The  mines  were  not  covered  with  basalt,  but  in 
many  cases  with  a  layer  of  rather  hard  limestone  or  calcareous 
tufa  similar  to  that  which  covers  a  large  part  of  the  surface  of 
the  country  in  this  neighborhood,  which  has  been  metamorphosed 
by  the  evaporation  of  water  charged  with  carbonate  of  lime. 

The  first  swarm  of  prospectors  on  the  ground  supposed  that 
the  diamonds  of  Dutoitspan  were  simply  a  sprinkling  strewn 
through  a  sand  wash  like  the  river-shore  deposit.  When  their 
shovels  struck  an  underlying  stratum  of  limestone  with  streaks 
of  greenish  shale,  at  a  depth  of  two  feet  or  less,  they  presumed 
that  this  corresponded  to  the  known  bedrock  of  the  placers 
along  the  Vaal,  and  had  no  thought  that  it  was  a  casing  for  any 
precious  stones.  So  they  simply  dug  through  the  soil  and 
shovelled  the' ground  into  heaps  to  be  sifted  dry  with  common 
wire  sieves  of  coarse  and  fine  mesh.  There  were  no  boulders 
in  this  soil  and  few  large  stones,  so  that  their  claims  could  be 
rapidly  worked.2 

The  ground  contained  a  plentiful  sprinkling  of  small  yellow- 
ish diamonds  and  some  larger  stones,  but  the  deposit  was  so 
shallow  that  it  soon  was  exhausted.  In  the  course  of  a  week  or 
two  one  dieeer  with  the  help  of  a  sorter  shovelled  and  sifted  all 

DO  I 

the  ground  of  his  claim,  thirty  feet  square,  and  moved  to  another, 
or  rambled  off  prospecting  over  the  farm  lands.8  There  seemed 

1  "  The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,   1872. 

2  Ibid.  *  Ibid. 


170      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

no  prospect  to  him  that  the  Dutoitspan  ridge  still  held  anything 
to  reward  the  labor  of  penetrating  a  rock  bed.  But  after  many 
prospectors  had  ransacked  the  soil  of  their  claims  and  abandoned 
them,  one  of  the  workers  on  the  ridge  or  elevated  land  had  the 
fancy  to  see  what  might  possibly  lie  under  the  stratum  of  lime- 
stone, and  determined  to  cut  a  few  feet,  at  least,  through  the  rock. 
He  found  that  the  limestone  soon  grew  so  soft  and  rotten  that 
it  could  be  split  easily  by  the  stroke  of  a  pick  and  the  lumps 
crushed  by  the  blow  of  a  shovel.  This  rotten  rock  fused  soon 
with  a  curious  decomposed  breccia  of  a  yellowish  color,  and 
the  sifting  of  this  ground  showed,  to  his  amazed  eyes,  the 
presence  of  diamonds  sparkling  on  his  sieve  or  on  the  sorting 
table.1 

With  the  spreading  of  this  discovery  there  came  another 
rush  of  diggers  to  the  ridge  that  soon  covered  every  patch  of 
unoccupied  ground  on  its  slopes.  Foot  after  foot  the  mining 
pits  sunk  through  the  soft  cement,  which  was  often  so  decom- 
posed that  jhe  point  of  a  pick  pierced  it  like  a  mass  of  dried 
mud.  Instead  of  decreasing  in  number,  the  quantity  of  gems 
in  a  claim  often  increased  with  the  deepening  of  the  pits,  and 
the  proportion  of  large  rough  diamonds  was  far  greater  below 
the  depth  of  a  fathom  than  in  the  surface  soil  or  the  crust  of  the 
limestone  stratum.  Payton  says  that  fragments  of  volcanic 
rocks  —  green  trap  and  basalt  chiefly — were  scattered  through 
the  limestone  and  yellow  ground ;  but  there  were  very  few  large 
boulders,  and  the  work  of  mining  was  far  less  laborious  than 
any  pit-driving  in  the  river  bank  at  Klip-drift  and  Pniel.2 

Some  cut  adits  at  varying  angles  in  the  slope  of  the  ridge, 
and  carried  out  their  ground  in  buckets  or  wheelbarrows.  This 
method  of  mining  shunned  the  toil  of  lifting  heavy  buckets  out 
of  the  pits,  but  it  was  dangerous  from  the  frequent  ground 
slides  and  rock  falls,  and  caused  many  a  wrangle  when  adit  lines 
crossed  or  pits  met  the  tunnels.  Others  opened  their  claims 
by  cutting  a  series  of  descending  stages,  diminishing  in  size  step 
by  step,  so  that  the  pit  bottom  was  reached  by  passing  down  a 

1  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,  1872.  2  Ibid. 


THE    RUSH    TO    KIMBERLEY  171 

rude  rock  staircase.  This  was  a  rapid  and  convenient  mode  of 
opening  ground  at  the  start,  but  where  claims  were  only  thirty 
feet  square,  it  was  clear  that  no  single  claim-holder  could  go  far 
down  in  this  way  without  reaching  a  point  where  the  bottom 
step  of  his  staircase  would  cover  the  floor  of  his  claim.  For  this 
reason  many  preferred  to  mine  more  slowly  in  small  perpen- 
dicular shafts,  in  whose  side  little  niches,  familiarly  known  as  toe 
holes,  were  cut,  so  that  agile  men  could  clamber  up  and  down. 
Or  the  shaft  bottom  was  reached  by  means  of  a  knotted  rope  or 
riem  of  rawhide,  dangling  into  the  pit  from  a  post  set  in  the 
ground  near  the  mouth  of  the  shaft.  When  a  bucket  was  filled 
with  broken  rock  by  a  digger  working  on  a  pit  floor,  his  mate 
hauled  up  the  load  by  winding  a  rope  stretching  from  the  handle 
over  a  rude  windlass,  or  by  sheer  lifting.  When  only  one 
digger  was  holding  a  claim,  he  was  obliged  to  clamber  out  of 
his  pit  and  haul  up  his  bucket  whenever  he  filled  it. 

To  extract  the  diamonds  the  broken  rock  was  pulverized 
by  beating  with  shovels  and  then  screened  in  a  common 
round  sieve  of  coarse  mesh,  to  separate  the  larger  stones 
that  were  worthless.  After  this  screening  the  ground  passing 
through  the  coarse  wire  mesh  was  carefully  sifted,  a  second  time, 
in  a  rocking  sieve  of  fine,  strong  wire.  This  sieve  was  set  in 
an  oblong  frame,  usually  about  three  feet  long  and  two  broad, 
with  handles  at  one  end  and  deep  notches  at  the  other,  gripping 
a  narrow  strip  of  rawhide  stretched  between  two  upright  posts 
called  sieve  props.  When  this  rocker  was  swung  rapidly,  all 
the  sand  and  dust  fell  through  the  wire  mesh,  leaving  a  concen- 
trate of  fine  chips  and  little  pebbles  of  limestone,  talc,  basalt,  and 
trap,  carrying  a  sprinkling  of  garnets,  peridot,  and  an  occasional 
diamond  crystal.  This  concentrate  was  then  taken  to  a  sorting 
table  and  scraped  over  in  the  same  way  as  the  river  gravel.1 

Diamond  winning  on  the  upland  was  easier,  at  first,  than 
working  the  river  placers ;  but  there  was  one  common  annoy- 
ance which  was  much  more  irritating  on  the  new  fields  than  at 

1  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,  1872.  "Among  the 
Diamonds,"  1870-1871. 


1 72       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

the  river  diggings.  Hot  winds  blew  the  red  dust  from  the  sur- 
rounding veld  in  clouds  over  the  workers,  and  these  dust  blasts 
were  mixed  with  the  powdered  white  limestone  and  pulverized 
cement  of  the  ridge,  shaken  through  the  sieves  and  blown  in 
the  faces  of  the  miners,  inflaming  their  eyes,  clogging  their 
noses,  and  even  coating  their  skin  through  their  clothes.  So 
fine  was  this  powder  and  so  sharply  blown  that  it  penetrated 
even  hunting-case  watches,  and  few  watches  could  be  kept  run- 
ning after  a  month  at  the  diggings  of  Dutoitspan.1 

But  this  was  comparatively  a  trivial  concern  to  ardent  dia- 
mond seekers,  winning  the  precious  stones  so  frequently. 
Every  day  swelled  the  rush  of  adventurers  to  the  pan,  bargain- 
ing for  halves,  quarters,  and  even  eighths  of  a  claim  on  the 
ridge,  and  roaming  over  every  foot  of  ground  of  Dorstfontein 
and  the  neighboring  farms  of  Bultfontein,  Vooruitzigt,  and  Alex- 
andersfontein  in  search  of  new  diamond  beds.  Oddly  enough, 
as  the  prospectors  thought,  no  spot  on  the  whole  farm  of  Dorst- 
fontein rewarded  their  search  outside  of  the  ridge  near  the  pan, 
and  for  months  no  better  luck  attended  the  hunting  for  dia- 
monds over  the  neighboring  farms.  But  where  one  party  of 
the  ardent  seekers  failed  to  find  diamonds,  another  followed  on 
its  track  and  scoured  the  face  of  the  farms  with  shovels  and 
sieves,  with  a  persistence  that  was  certain  to  be  rewarded,  in 
time,  if  any  diamond  surface  beds  existed  outside  of  the  ridge 
at  Dutoitspan.  In  the  frequent  sinking  of  pits,  also,  in  the 
basins,  for  water,  there  was  the  further  chance  of  piercing  some 
hidden  bed  of  diamonds,  for  the  search  for  springs  was  hardly 
less  keen  than  the  quest  for  precious  stones. 

So,  early  in  i8yi,2  diamonds  were  unearthed  in  the  surface 
soil  close  to  the  farmhouse  of  Bultfontein.  This  discovery  was 
followed  in  the  first  days  of  May  by  the  discovery  of  diamonds 
on  de  Beer's  farm,  Vooruitzigt,  about  two  miles  from  Dutoits- 
pan.3 Two  months  later  a  second  diamond  bed  was  uncov- 

1  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Pay  ton,  1872.          2  Ibid. 
3  Ibid.      [These  dates  differ  somewhat  from  those  given  by  Theal  and  others. 
Payton  was  on  the  ground  in  July,  1871,  and  his  account  should  be  most  accurate.] 


bne  aisaS  sQ  stfi  rbiriw  n<- 


i  II    AFRICA 

.-,  -ed  Just  from  the  sur- 

.    and   these  dust  blasts 

»  ..aiesrone  and  pulverized 

the  sieves   and   blown  in 

-heir    eyes,   clogging   their 

nrouch   their  clothes.      So 

,    Viown   that  it  penetrated 

.  hes  could   be  kept  run- 

•    roirspan.1 

••/r.cern   to  ardent  dia- 

o!  es    so    frequently. 

->  the  pan,  bargain- 

a    claim  on   the 

f  Dorstfontein 

•>i.:f,  and  Alex- 

>  .  ily  enough, 

The  Homestead  of^he  Farm  Vooruitzigt  on  which  are  De  Beers  and 
Kimberley  Mines. 

•\£  for  dia- 

party  of 

r:i:j,_;  followed  on 

i)f  riv:  ;t!'i    shovels   and 

\v:is    ccrra  •.          be    rewarded,  in 

•  l«.;-ii>  exists  i  viutsicle  of  the  ridge 

.iuern.  si^kiirj-    of   [v,ts,  also,    in    the 

-lie  further  cr.aix^      '    v'^rting  some 

for        '  seitu'h    f--;          •  js  was  hardly 

.liamot-d-  werv  unc  in   the  surface 

'    -•-..-  r,|    U'i':;o.':ci  i.       i  :-iv  discovery  was 

,,    M:t\   bv  :iv.  •  cry  of  diamonds 

ftv   .).  •"•!,   :ibr.'.!        •    '    cules   from    Dutoits- 

.np.;l    .;4i  t!Vit.!:d    bed    was   uncov- 

,.n.   iH-z.          -  Ibid. 

,  i;'f.     .    ,.-   .>  .     ...\.  .  t>v  Theal  and   others, 

j-i     j;:  :  -..iin  -\\  •:. :J  He  iiv/,t  accurate.] 


OF    -h'5 

UNIVERSE 

OP 


THE    RUSH    TO    KIMBERLEY 


173 


ered  on  the  same  farm,  lying  on  a  gently  sloping  kopje,  at  a 
distance  from  the  first  location  roughly  reckoned  at  a  mile. 
This  kopje  had  been  searched  twice  by  prospectors,  it  is  said, 
without  success,  and  one  report  says  that  the  deposit  was  finally 
discovered  through  the  sinking  of  a  well  on  the  ground.1  The 
diggers  drove  their  well  down  seventy-six  feet  without  finding 
water,  but  at  this  depth  one  was  amazed  to  see  a  diamond  of 
eighty-seven  carats  sparkling  on  the  wall  of  his  dry  pit. 

So  many  conflicting  state- 
ments have  been  made  as  to 
the  discovery  of  the  first  dia- 
mond at  this  location,  called 
New  Rush  or  Colesberg  Kopje, 
and  afterward  famous  as  Kim- 
berley  Mine,  that  I  have  been 
perplexed  to  decide  to  which 
story  the  most  credence  should 
be  given.  The  difficulty  in  ob- 
taining trustworthy  data  arises 
from  the  fact  that  few  of  the 
original  diggers  are  still  alive, 
and  that  most  of  those  who 
are  still  living  are  scattered  to 
all  parts  of  the  world.  More- 
over one  cannot  always  rely 
upon  the  accuracy  of  the  mem- 
ory of  the  old  diggers  now  living  upon  the  Fields  as  to  dates 
and  details  after  the  lapse  of  more  than  thirty  years.  After 
diligent  sifting  of  all  reports  and  records,  however,  the  following 
conclusion  may  be  said  to  be  well  determined. 

Through  the  courtesy  of  Mrs.  Grimmer,  the  widow  of  Dr. 
Grimmer,  a  practising  physician  at  Colesberg  when  the  Diamond 
Fields  were  discovered,  I  was  enabled  to  meet  Mrs.  Raw- 
storne,  the  mother  of  Fleetwood  Rawstorne,  then  (1900)  living 
at  Cape  Town.  She  is  a  fine-looking  old  lady,  as  her  portrait 
1  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Pay  ton,  1872. 


Mrs.  Rawstorne. 


174      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


shows,  well  preserved  after  a  long  and  eventful  life  in  South 
Africa.  She  was  eighty-two  years  old  at  the  time  of  our  meeting. 
Her  memory  took  her  back  to  the  days  of  the  discovery,  and 
she  related  the  incidents  of  the  Fields  as  clearly  as  if  they  had 
happened  but  yesterday.  The  photograph,  here  reproduced,  of 
the  discoverer  of  Kimberley  mine  and  his  party  was  taken  a  few 
days  after  the  discovery  of  diamonds  on  Colesberg  Kopje. 
Fleetwood  Rawstorne  stands  in  the  middle  of  the  group  (page 
175),  in  the  shade  of  a  fine  specimen  of  the  camelthorn  trees 

which  grew  upon  the  mine.  They 
had  only  begun  to  dig  prospect- 
ing holes.  The  cut  on  page  176 
shows  the  primitive  method  of 
working  the  diamond  -  bearing 
ground.  I  had  the  story  of  the 
discovery  also  from  Mr.  T.  B. 
Kisch,  who  states  that  he  is  the 
only  one  now  living  of  the  first 
four  locators. 

Fleetwood  Rawstorne,  T.  B. 
Kisch,  and  two  other  diggers 
were  prospecting  on  this  kopje 
during  the  month  of  July,  1871. 
Some  of  the  party  thought  they 
saw  "indications"  of  diamond 
deposits,  and  Rawstorne  sent  his 
Kafir  servant  to  prospect  thor- 
oughly the  spot  in  view.  The  Kafir  returned  to  his  master  with 
a  diamond  of  about  two  carats  weight.  This  discovery  was  made 
known  at  once  to  the  other  members  of  the  party,  and  all  went 
immediately  to  the  spot  and  marked  and  pegged  off"  their  claims  ; 
Rawstorne  pegging  three,  two  as  a  reward  for  discovery  and  one 
as  a  digger.  After  the  claims  had  been  pegged  off  Rawstorne 
went  to  the  authorities  and  reported  his  discovery.  On  the 
following  day  the  government  surveyor  was  sent  to  mark  off  the 
claims  and  allot  them  according  to  the  existing  law  or  custom. 


Mr.  'I'.  B.  Kisch.  (The  only  one  now  living 
of  the  first  party  who  located  claims  on 
Kimberley  Mine.) 


THE    RUSH    TO    KIMBERLEY 


Kimberley  Mine  just  after  the  Discovery,  July,  1871- 

The  name  of  Colesberg  Kopje  was  given  to  the  hillock 
because  the  lucky  diggers,  headed  by  Rawstorne,  came  to 
the  field  from  the  town  of  Colesberg,  near  the  Orange  River. 
The  instant  flocking  of  people  to  the  two  Vooruitzigt  farm 
diggings  caused  them  to  be  roughly  distinguished  as  "  De  Beers 
Rush"  or  "  Old  De  Beers,"  and  "  De  Beers  New  Rush,"  or  the 
"  Colesberg  Kopje  "  -  names  which  endured  some  months,  until 
the  "  New  Rush  "  was  rechristened  Kimberley  in  honor  of  the 
British  secretary  for  the  colonies. 

This  inroad  of  squatting  prospectors  was  greatly  vexing  at  first 
to  the  owners  of  the  diamond-bearing  farms.  It  disturbed  the 
use  of  the  ground  for  stock-raising  purposes,  and  if  there  were 
any  diamonds  on  the  land,  the  purchasing  speculators  wanted  to 
hold  the  beds  for  their  own  exclusive  development  and  profit. 
But  it  was  soon  evident  that  this  design  was  impracticable.  The 
swarm  that  covered  the  ground  could  not  be  held  in  check  by 
any  force  at  command  of  the  owners,  and  stiffly  refused  to  recog- 


176      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF    SOUTH    AFRICA 

nize  any  assertion  of  legal  claims  that  took  the  form  of  monopoly 
titles.     The  first  diggers  on  the  Bultfontein  farm  were  warned 

oo 

off  by  the  owners  for  trespass.  There  was  a  momentary  hesita- 
tion till  the  rush  was  swelled  by  numbers  so  large  that  the  for- 
bidden ground  was  "jumped"  in  an  hour,  and  diggers  upturned 
the  soil  to  the  very  door  of  the  farmhouse.  Then  the  owners 
called  on  the  Orange  Free  State  police  for  help,  and  the  miners 
were  driven  away  for  some  days  ;  but  the  certainty  of  another  irre- 
sistible rush  was  so  ominous  that,  toward  the  end  of  May  (1871), 
the  proprietors  opened  the  field  to  all  comers  on  payment  of  a 
license  of  ten  shillings  a  month  for  each  claim  of  thirty  feet  square.1 
In  the  grants  of  farms  by  the  Dutch  East  India  Company 
there  had  been  no  reservation  of  mineral  rights,  but  from  the 
time  of  the  cession  to  Great  Britain,  MacNab  says  the  grant  of 
lands  did  not  carry  a  title  to  "  precious  stones,  gold,  and  silver," 
which  were  explicitly  excluded,  and  in  1860  it  was  enacted  in 


Kimberley  Mine  just  after  the  Discovery,  July,  1871. 

1  "  The    Diamond    Diggings    of   South   Africa,"    Payton,    1872. 
Africa,"  Theal,   1888-1893. 


South 


THE    RUSH    TO    KIMBERLEY 


177 


Parliament  that  no  lands  containing  valuable  minerals  should 
be  considered  waste  lands  of  the  crown  for  purposes  of  sale. 
This  did  not  apply  to  Griqualand  West,  as  there  was  no  min- 
eral or  precious  stones  act  or  ordinance  in  force  in  this  terri- 
tory until  Ordinance  No.  3  of  1871,  of  the  Orange  Free  State 
Government.1  Whether  there  were  mineral  reservations  in  the 
diamond-bearing-farm  deeds  was 
not  questioned  by  the  inrush- 
ing  diggers.  They  would  not 
suffer  exclusion  without  a  fight, 
but  they  were  willing  to  pay  small 
license  charges  to  the  farm  own- 
ers for  the  privilege  of  working 
allotted  claims.  The  size  of  these 
claims  was  fixed  by  agreement 
with  representative  "  Diggers' 
Committees,"  chosen  by  the  pros- 
pectors in  mass  meeting,  and  these 
committees  determined  also  the 
simple  mining  regulations  and 
camp  rules.  One  committee  had 
charge  of  the  Dutoitspan  and 
Bultfontein  mining  camps,  and 
another  directed  the  mining  at 
De  Beers  and  the  Colesberg 
Kopje,  pitching  its  official  tent 
midway  between  these  two  dia- 
mond beds.2 


Fleetwood  Rawstorne. 


The  Orange  Free  State  claimed  the  new  diamond  fields  as 
part  of  its  territory,  but  its  right  of  control  was  not  vigorously 
asserted  in  practice.  There  was  a  rising  issue  from  the  time  of 
the  discovery  at  Dutoitspan  touching  the  ownership  of  the 
district  containing  the  diamond-bearing  farms  and  the  diggings 
on  the  line  of  the  Vaal.  The  South  African  Republic  claimed 

1  "On  Veld  and  Farm,"  Frances  MacNab,  London,  1897. 

2  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"   Pay  ton,  1872. 


178       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

the  ground  north  and  west  of  the  river,  as  before  noted,  but  the 
miners  at  Klip-drift  had  continued  to  maintain  their  rude  Republic 
or  independent  camp,  drifting  into  a  condition  verging  on  anar- 
chy, under  the  doubtful  control  of  a  factious  "  Executive  Commit- 
tee," until  December  13,  1871,  when  the  camp  gladly  submitted 
to  the  authority  of  a  provisional  magistrate,  appointed  by 
Lieutenant  General  Hay,  her  Majesty's  High  Commissioner.1 
This  energetic  official  had  his  eyes  widely  open  to  the  possible 
value  and  extent  of  the  new  diamond-bearing  field,  and  was  not 
only  disposed  to  sustain  the  appeal  of  the  river  diggers  against 
the  monopoly  grant  of  the  Transvaal  Republic,  but  wrote 
to  President  Brand,  the  head  of  the  Orange  Free  State,  in 
September,  1870,  questioning  the  title  of  the  Free  State  to  the 
Dutoitspan  fields  and  the  river  diggings  at  Pniel.2 

At  the  time  of  the  creation  of  the  Orange  Free  State  out 
of  the  domain  included  in  the  Orange  River  Sovereignty,  there 
had  been  explicit  recognition  of  reservations  set  apart  for  the 
Basutos,  Koranas,  and  Griquas,  —  native  tribes  dwelling  within 
the  limits  of  the  Sovereignty.  But  there  was  an  apparent  lack 
of  precision  in  the  reservations  or  claims  of  the  Koranas  and 
Griquas  especially,  which  was  accounted  of  little  consequence  at 
the  time,  until  the  discovery  of  diamonds,  on  a  tract  otherwise 
not  worth  contesting,  aroused  rival  claimants.  The  Berlin 
Mission  Society  claimed  the  diggings  at  Pniel  on  the  strength  of 
a  deed  of  sale  of  part  of  the  Korana  reserve.  Nicholas  Waterboer 
and  other  Griqua  chiefs,  doubtless  prompted  by  speculative  agents, 
set  up  their  claim  to  a  considerable  stretch  of  ground,  covering 
Klip-drift  and  Pniel  as  well  as  the  upper  angle  between  the 
Orange  and  the  Vaal,  containing  the  diamond  fields  of  Dutoits- 
pan and  the  surrounding  farms.  The  Orange  Free  State  did 
not  dispute  the  right  of  the  natives  to  hold  such  reservations  as 
had  been  assigned  to  them  by  the  British  Government,  but  con- 
tended that  the  stretch  of  the  native  tribal  claims  was  wholly 
unjustified,  and  that  Pniel  and  Dutoitspan  were  clearly  within 
the  bounds  of  its  domain.* 

1  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,  1872. 

2  "South  Africa,"  Theal.  3  Ibid. 


THE    RUSH    TO    KIMBERLEY 


179 


Batlapin  Chiefs  and  their  Councillors. 


Bolitsitse  Gasibone. 


A  Batlapin  Chief  and  his  Councillors. 

Some  of  the  Native  Chiefs  dealt  with  by  Mr.  Richard  Southey,  Lieutenant  Governor  of  Griqualand 
West,  during  his  Administration. 


i8o       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


Sir  Henry  Barkly  succeeded  Lieutenant  General  Hay  early 
in  1871  as  her  Majesty's  High  Commissioner  and  Governor  of 
Cape  Colony,  and  was  expressly  instructed  by  Earl  Kimberley, 
the  British  secretary  for  the  colonies  (January  24,  1871),  not  to 
countenance  any  annexation  of  territory  outside  of  the  uncon- 
tested  limits  of  Cape  Colony,  which  the  Colony  would  be 
unable  to  govern  and  defend  with  its  own  unaided  resources. 
But  the  new  High  Commissioner  —  viewing  the  situation  and 
the  course  of  his  predecessor,  which  he  cordially  approved  — 
replied  to  his  instructions  bluntly  that  the  British  Government 
"  had  already  gone  too  far  to  sdmit  of  its  ceasing  to  support  the 
cause  of  either  Waterboer  or  the  diggers."  He  concluded  an 
arrangement,  accordingly,  for  the  transfer  to  Great  Britain  of 
the  claims  of  the  native  chiefs,  subject  to  the  ratification  of  the 
Home  Government,  and  his  representations  secured  the  consent 
of  the  Ministry,  in  the  following  May,  to  the  transfer,  and  to 
the  assertion  of  British  sovereignty  over  the  disputed  territory, 
pending  the  final  decision  of  the  special  court  of  arbitration 
which  had  been  convened  by  the  agreement  of  the  contesting 
claimants. 

The  court  had  been  opened,  in  the  previous  April  (1871), 
in  the  village  of  Bloemfontein.  After  considering  the  evidence 

presented,  the 
judges  disagreed, 
and  the  disposi- 
tion of  the  terri- 
tory depended 
upon  the  award 
of  the  referee, 
Lieutenant  Gov- 
ernor Keate,  of 
Natal.  This  was 
not  rendered  un- 
til the  1 7th  of  October  following,  and  it  does  not  appear  that 
the  decision  was  hurried  or  improperly  influenced.  But  it  was 

1  "South  Africa,"  Theal. 


The  first  Government  House  and  Buildings  of  the  Colony  of 
Griqualand  West. 


H    AFRICA 

i  General   Hay  early 

.ioner  and   Governor  of 

'  icted  by  Karl   Kimberley, 

-,    januurv  24,  1871),  not  to 

-irory  outside   of  the  uncon- 

hich    the    Colony   would    be 

its   ',-VMI  unaided   resources. 

•  -  vifu'iiu;  the  situation  and 

h    he   Cordially  approved  — 

•   the    British   Government 

;  ceasing  to  support  the 

lie  concluded  an 

to   Great  Britain  of 

ratification  of  the 

jred  the  consent 

-ansfer,  and  to 

PORTRAIT    OF    SIR    RICHARD    SOUTHEY, 

Born  April  25th,   1808;    Died    1901. 

*t    contesting 

'pnl  (1871), 
-ne  evidence 
evented,    the 
f-s  disagreed, 
.'he  disposi- 
;>t  the  terri- 
depended 
•:pon    the   award 
the     referee, 
1  .ieutenant  Gov- 
^^      ernor    Keate,    of 
Natal.    This  was 
not  rendered  un- 
•s  not  appear  that 
nceJ,      But  it  was 


THE    RUSH    TO    KIMBERLEY 


181 


warmly  denounced  as  partial  in  sweeping  aside  the  claims  of  the 
Orange  Free  State  and  the  Transvaal  Republic,  and  confirming 
the  alleged  title  of  Waterboer  and  other  native  chiefs  to  a  tract 
covering  17,800  square  miles,  and  including  the  Dutoitspan, 
Bultfontein,  De  Beers,  and  Kimberley  diamond  mines,  as  well  as 


Sir  Richard  Southey's  Residence,  Kimberley. 

the  diggings  along  the  Vaal.  Four  days  after  this  award  had 
been  made,  Sir  Henry  Barldy  proclaimed  the  grant  to  the  native 
chiefs  a  part  of  the  British  dominions,  as  the  Crown  Colony  of 
Griqualand  West,  which  was  placed  under  the  administration 
of  a  Lieutenant  Governor,  Mr.  Richard  Southey.1  Thus  the 
control  of  the  Diamond  Fields  was  finally  determined,  and  it  is 
impossible  to  doubt  that  this  settlement  was  greatly  contributory 
to  the  extraordinary  advance  of  diamond  mining  in  these  fields, 
as  well  as  to  the  uplifting  and  development  of  the  Colonies,  and 
to  the  push  of  civilization  into  the  heart  of  the  dark  continent. 
It  has  been  contended  that  the  award  was  unjust  to  both 
of  the  Boer  Republics,  and  this  contention  has  been  supported  by 
the  citation  of  a  court  decision  rendered  several  years  later,  and 
the  allowance  of  ^90,000  to  the  Orange  Free  State  by  the  Lon- 
don Convention  of  1876,  in  compensation  for  losses  sustained 
1  "South  Africa,"  Theal. 


i8i       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

through  the  creation  of  Griqualand  West.  But  it  has  been 
fairly  pointed  out  by  the  leading  historian  of  South  Africa, 
Theal,  an  earnest  supporter  of  the  rights  of  the  Orange  Free 
State  and  her  sister  Republic,  that  the  claims  of  both  contest- 
ants were  weakly  presented  at  the  Bloemfontein  court,  and  that 
Lieutenant  Governor  Keate  cannot  be  reproached  justly  for  any 
conscious  unfairness  in  deciding  the  case  upon  the  evidence 
before  him,  in  a  manner  unsatisfactory  to  the  Republics  on  the 
line  of  the  Vaal. 

There  is,  further,  the  practical  view  to  present  of  the  incor- 
poration of  the  Diamond  Fields  in  Griqualand  West,  —  that  this 
was  the  only  feasible  solution  of  the  situation,  at  that  time, 
which  guaranteed  to  the  irresistible  rush  of  diamond  seekers 
from  the  Cape  and  all  parts  of  the  world  a  government  so 
strong  that  it  could  enforce  its  authority  without  recourse  to 
arms  and  bloodshed.  Klip-drift  had  already  revolted  at  the  first 
preposterous  stretch  of  authority  of  the  South  African  Repub- 
lic, and  maintained  its  independence  until  it  submitted  docilely 
to  the  British  High  Commissioner.  The  seething  influx  on  the 
upland  Diamond  Fields  was  clearly  on  the  verge  of  rebellion 
against  any  Free  State  regulations  restricting  their  right  of 
entry  or  supporting  any  monopoly  title.  Great  Britain,  with 
all  her  array  of  Imperial  power,  would  not  have  ventured  to 
assert  such  claims  as  had  been  set  up  by  both  of  the  Boer 
Republics,  and  could  not  have  enforced  them  without  an  army 
on  the  spot.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  she  prudently  suffered  the 
miners  to  occupy  the  land  without  any  attempt  to  maintain 
crown  reservations  of  mineral  rights,  even  after  her  supremacy 
was  undisputed  through  the  formation  of  the  Crown  Colony. 
The  Boer  Republics,  on  the  other  hand,  would  have  continued 
to  blunder,  almost  certainly,  as  they  had  been  doing,  if  control 
of  the  Fields  had  been  turned  over  to  them  nominally  by  the 
decision  of  the  referee. 

It  did  not  appear  at  that  time,  either,  that  there  was  any 
strong  desire  on  the  part  of  the  authorities  of  these  Republics 
to  assume  the  cost  and  responsibility  and  prospect  of  collision 


THE    RUSH    TO    KIMBERLEY  183 

which  the  supported  assertion  of  control  of  the  Diamond  Fields 
would  have  involved.  The  founders  of  these  states  had  sought 

o 

only  the  plain  homes  of  farmers  and  shepherds  on  the  veld, 
under  a  government  of  their  own  choosing.  Neither  they  nor 
their  children  were  greatly  stirred  by  the  uncovering  of  dia- 
monds, or  the  prospect  of  finding  more  on  their  lands.  They 
disliked  the  spreading  rush  to  the  Diamond  Fields,  even  when 
it  was  presumed  that  their  own  mines  were  developing.  The 
plain,  stolid  farming  folk,  stiffly  set  in  their  old-fashioned  ways, 
had  little  in  common  with  the  sanguine  adventurers,  delighting 
in  stirs  and  surprises  and  novelties.  Baines  tells  a  story  of  the 
mobbing  of  the  first  surveyor  who  tried  to  use  a  theodolite  in 
the  streets  of  Potchefstrom,  instead  of  stepping  off  the  distance 
in  the  good  old  way  of  the  "  veld-vlak-meester."  He  avers, 
too,  that  he  was  himself  made  "  vogel  vrie,"  "  free  as  a  bird  for 
anybody  to  shoot  at,"  for  the  crime  of  concealing  a  sextant 
about  his  person.1  This  may  be  a  fanciful  stretch  of  fact,  but 
there  is  no  doubt  of  the  ingrained  conservatism  of  the  Boers. 
How  could  such  a  people  sympathize  with  the  impetuous  and 
ardent  spirits  that  rushed  to  the  Diamond  Fields,  and  what  pros- 
pect was  there  of  the  docile  submission  of  the  one  to  the  other ! 
It  can  scarcely  be  questioned,  therefore,  by  a  candid  observer 
that  the  conclusion  of  Lieutenant  Governor  Keate  was  the  best 
practical  settlement,  if  not  the  most  impartial  and  accurate. 

It  was  not  to  be  expected,  however,  that  this  significant 
departure  from  the  halting  policy  of  former  ministries,  this  for- 
ward step  of  Greater  Britain  into  the  heart  of  a  region  hitherto 
indifferently  resigned  to  the  migrating  Boers,  should  be  viewed 
with  resignation  by  the  embittered  Republics  whose  claims  were 
disallowed.  Resentment  ran  so  high  in  the  Transvaal  that 
President  Pretorius  was  forced  to  resign.  His  place  was  filled 
by  a  clergyman,  Thomas  Francois  Burgers,  and,  after  the  short 
sharp  war  for  independence  in  1 880-81,  by  Stephen  J.  Paul 
Kruger,  a  marcher  with  the  Great  Trek  from  the  Cape  to  the 
Limpopo,  a  lion  killer  from  boyhood  as  dauntless  as  David, 

1  "  The  Gold  Regions  of  Southeastern  Africa,"  Thomas  Baines. 


1 84       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

a  crafty  politician  and  a  religious  exhorter,  a  Covenanter  of  the 
Covenanters,  a  Boer  of  the  Boers,  uncouth,  unschooled,  con- 
ceited, bigoted,  grasping,  bristling  with  suspicion  and  prejudice, 
tickled  with  gross  flattery,  but  a  man  of  iron  nerve,  intensely 
loyal  to  his  people  and  their  push  for  independence,  self-contained, 
self-reliant,  bold,  wary,  cunning,  ambitious,  dominating,  fore- 
handed—  masking  his  plans,  biding  his  time,  resolute  in  action, 
and  far-seeing  in  shaping  the  future  of  his  Republic.  In  the  in- 
clusion of  the  precious  diamond-bearing  province  in  Griqualand 
West,  an  inveterate  antagonist  of  British  Imperial  extension  was 
raised  to  power,  whose  keen  forecast  was  almost  able  to  over- 
balance the  impulse  of  this  great  accession  to  the  upbuilding  of 
Greater  Britain  in  South  Africa.1  On  the  coat  of  arms  of  the 
Transvaal  Republic  a  lion  lay  crouching,  ready  to  spring.  From 
the  day  of  Kruger's  rise  to  head  the  Republic,  the  lion  of  the 
Transvaal  has  never  shut  his  eyes  nor  feared  to  show  his  teeth. 

While  this  protracted  controversy  for  the  control  of  the 
Diamond  Fields  was  dragging  on,  the  rush  to  the  diggings  had 
been  spreading  and  moving  from  the  ports  of  Australia,  India, 
and  China ;  from  California,  Canada,  and  the  Eastern  Atlantic 
states  of  the  American  Union  —  from  Great  Britain  and  Ireland 
and  the  countries  of  Western  and  Central  Europe ;  from  every 
region  of  the  civilized  world,  at  length,  where  men  of  restless 
and  sanguine  temper  were  living,  who  could  command  the  price 
of  the  passage  to  diamond-bearing  placers,  unmeasured  in  num- 
ber, extent,  and  richness.  The  virgin  fields  of  California  and 
Australia,  once  so  glittering  with  gold  and  so  potent  in  attraction, 
had  lost  their  glamour  with  the  scouring  of  their  sands  and  the 
passing  of  their  novelties.  It  had  been  demonstrated  with  plain, 
cold  figures  and  dismal  accuracy  that  the  average  farmer  was  get- 
ting far  more  from  his  wheat  or  potato  patch  than  the  average 
prospector  from  his  scramble  in  a  gold-field.  But  who  could 
calculate,  or  even  pretend  to  predict  with  any  assurance,  the  pros- 

1  "  South  Africa,"  Theal.  "Impressions  of  South  Africa,"  James  Bryce. 
"  The  Story  of  South  Africa,"  William  Basil  Worsfold.  "  Cecil  John  Rhodes," 
Biography,  "  Imperialist." 


-I  (185) 


STEPHEN   J.   PAUL   KRUGER. 
(From  a  Photograph  taken  at  Kimberley,  1884.) 


i86       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

pect  of  fortune  in  this  African  wonderland,  so  phenomenal  in 
character  and  so  slightly  explored  !  Here  was  a  strange,  luring 
beacon  in  the  heart  of  traditional  Ophir,  where  river  banks  were 
apparently  lined  with  diamonds,  where  diamonds  were  strewn 
on  the  face  of  farms,  where  children  had  diamonds  to  roll  like 
marbles,  where  wells  were  driven  through  diamond  beds,  and 
huts  were  plastered  with  diamond-studded  cement.  Who  would 
not  rush  to  a  region  so  sparkling  in  promise,  so  embalmed  in 
traditions  of  resplendent  empire,  where  another  Koh-i-nur  might 
be  lying  in  wait  in  the  dust  for  the  first  passer-by,  and  where  a 
lucky  adventurer  might  stuff  his  pockets  with  gems  far  surpass- 
ing the  hoard  of  any  extortionate  nabob,  and  return  home  with 
a  treasure  that  he  could  carry  as  lightly  as  a  full  purse  ! 

The  river  placers  had  not  drawn  largely  outside  of  the  south- 
ern African  colonies,  but  the  discoveries  at  Dutoitspan,  Bultfon- 
tein,  De  Beers,  and  Kimberley  were  so  unexampled,  and  the 
mines  on  the  surface  were  soon  shown  to  be  so  marvellous, 
that  their  magnetic  attraction  was  felt  all  over  the  globe.  Who 
can  wonder,  then,  that  the  flying,  inflated,  distorted  rumors 
from  this  African  hot-bed  puffed  up  ardent  fancy  everywhere  as 
tongues  of  flames  in  tinder,  and  that  men  of  all  nations,  call- 
ings, and  characters  were  swept  along  in  the  rush  to  the  South 
African  Diamond  Fields  !  Every  sailing  ship  or  steamer  that  was 
bound  for  a  South  African  port  from  any  part  of  the  world, 
in  1871,  bore  some  adventurers  to  the  new  fields.  Some 
had  good  outfits  and  supplies  of  money,  while  others  had  barely 
been  able  to  scrape  together  their  passage  costs.  The  seamen 
on  the  ship  caught  the  infectious  diamond  fever,  and  ran  away 
when  the  vessels  were  moored  on  the  African  coast,  as  their 
mates  had  done,  years  before,  in  the  ports  of  California  and  Aus- 
tralia. Nothing  but  actual  bonds  could  hold  back  the  diamond 
seekers,  and  these  would  not  serve  if  there  was  any  chance  to 
cut  cords  and  break  irons. 

The  swarming  of  adventurers  over  mountain  terraces,  veld, 
and  karoo  was  more  motley  and  ardent  than  the  first  rush  to  the 
Vaal,  and  every  one  was  consumed  by  the  fear  that  others  ahead 


THE    RUSH    TO    KIMBERLEY  T87 

of  him  were  dividing  up  the  rich  ground  and  a  day's  delay  might 
cost  him  a  fortune.  So  never  before  was  there  such  a  scurrying, 
reckless  of  lagging  ox-teams  and  horses,  blazing  suns,  and  blind- 
ing dust.  What  a  fuming  there  was,  too,  on  the  river  banks 
when  the  sudden  floods  halted  the  rush  with  their  impassable 
torrents,  and  the  pilgrims  on  nettles  watched  the  yellow  water 
run  surging,  swirling,  and  whirling  between  them  and  their  goal  ! 
Most  of  the  adventurers  still  plodded  along  with  their  bul- 
lock wagons,  but  some  who  could  afford  to  pay  roundly  G£i2) 
for  transport  were  carried  to  the  Diamond  Fields  by  the  wagons 
of  the  Inland  Transport  Company,  an  enterprising  association 


Coach  leaving  Kimberley  for  the  Coast,  1875. 

which  undertook  to  run  a  regular  coach-line  to  the  Vaal  from 
Wellington,  the  terminus  of  the  short  Cape  railway  in  1870. 
The  carriage  was  a  long,  narrow  wagon  with  five  rows  of  seats 
for  fourteen  passengers  and  a  driver.  Only  forty  pounds  of 
baggage  could  be  carried  by  a  passenger,  but  men  who  were 
anxious  to  reach  the  mines  were  ready  to  start  without  even  a 
shift  of  shirts.  Eight  wiry  horses  dragged  this  rattling  wagon 
over  the  rough  track  at  a  lively  rate,  changing  teams  at  relay  sta- 
tions, from  thirty  to  forty  miles  apart,  and  making  the  trip  to  the 
Vaal  in  eight  or  nine  days  when  the  way  was  not  blocked  by 
floods.  By  this  stride  of  progress  the  journey  from  Cape  Town 
was  made  in  less  than  a  quarter  of  the  time  required  by  the 
crawling  ox-wagons  from  the  other  coast  ports,  although  these 


i88       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

towns  were  two  hundred  miles  nearer  the  Diamond  Fields.  This 
was  proudly  noted  as  an  advance  of  rapid  transit,  which  prom- 
ised greater  developments,  and  was  one  of  the  many  stirring 
impulses  of  the  diamond  discoveries.  But  as  only  one  stage- 
coach started  weekly  from  Wellington,  the  chief  contribution  of 
the  new  line  to  South  Africa  lay  in  its  promise  rather  than  its 
performance.1  It  was  the  first  push  of  the  enterprise  which  has 
followed  its  hoof  tracks' through  the  African  desert  with  the  tire- 
less race  of  the  iron  horse. 

While  this  swarm  was  gathering  from  India,  Australia, 
Europe,  and  America,  and  pressing  toward  the  diamond  mines 
through  the  southern  Colonial  ports,  another  swarm  was  enter- 
ing the  fields  from  inland  Africa.  To  the  native  tribesmen  the 

o 

opening  of  the  diamond  mines  was  a  certain  Golconda.  For  the 
shovelling  of  gravel  under  a  burning  sun,  for  the  heaving  of 
boulders,  for  the  shaking  of  cradles  in  the  midst  of  whirling  dust, 
for  the  quarrying  in  pits  and  the  scraping  on  sorting  tables, — 
the  wiry  sinews,  pliant  muscles,  nimble  fingers,  and  sharp  eyes  of 
Africans,  inured  to  the  scorch  of  the  sun,  the  pelt  of  the  rain, 
and  the  blast  of  the  sand,  were  greatly  serviceable.  So  there  was 
a  cordial  greeting  of  the  influx  of  natives,  ready  to  work  for  the 
barest  pittance  of  pay  while  their  masters  lolled  in  the  shade. 

First  came  the  neighboring  Griquas,  Koranas,  and  Batlapins, 
with  Basutos  from  their  southern  reservation,  followed  by  a 
stream  of  Zulus,  Mahowas,  Malakakas,  and  Hottentots,  and 
Kafirs  of  one  hundred  tribes,  ranging  east  to  the  Indian  Ocean 
and  far  northwest  into  Namaqua  and  Bechuana  lands  and  north- 
east into  Matabeleland  and  the  regions  lying  beyond  the  Limpopo 
and  the  Zambesi.2  There  was  every  shade  of  dusky  color  in  this 
throng,  from  livid  and  tawny  yellow  to  jet  black.  Some  stalked 
proudly  over  the  veld  in  the  full  plumage  of  the  Zulu  veteran, 
with  flowing  ox-tail  girdles,  armlets,  and  anklets,  decked  with 

1  "Among  the  Diamonds,"   1870-1871. 

2  "  The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,  1872.      "South  Afri- 
can Diamond  Fields  and  Journey  to  Mines,"  William  James  Morton,  M.D.,  New 
York,  1877. 


.ill    AFRICA 

ht-  Diamond  Fields.     This 
•  npid   transit,  which  prom- 
A.IS  one  of  the   many  stirring 
cries.      Hut   as  only  one  stage- 
. iip.gton,  the  thief  contribution  of 
lay  in   its   promise   rather  than  its 
irst  push  of  rhe  enterprise  which  has 
Mi!.'  Afrcan  desert  with  the  tire- 
India,    Australia, 
•he  diamond  mines 
^arm  was  enter- 
•ribesmen  the 
nda.      For  the 

.  .•  fu-   heaving  of 

i  whirling  dust, 
...rting  tables, — 
NATIVES   SEEKING   WORK. 

of  the  rain, 
there  was 
•  •rk   for  the 
df"  p  •-  t-)i  )•  ••"   shade. 

id  Batlapins, 
Allowed   by  a 

v:i,.  1  !>>ttentots,  and 

MIC  Indian   Ocean 

;oua  and  l»vchiKin;i  'a'v.is  and  north- 

Syini^  bey nn .;  the  Limpopo 

;)t  J'isky  color  in  this 

an  1  •  ;\\n  -. -''>..      Some  stalked 

;ni-.iu;c  ot   the   Zulu  veteran, 

..-!  v.  :-ilets,  dn<      :".kiets,    decked  with 

id   I"  ru-.i,"    l'r>:  ••:•,    i^~2.       "  S^uth    Afri- 

vV'ii  ."D-«  Morton,  M.D.,  New 


THE    RUSH   TO    KIMBERLEY  189 

waving  feathers  and  gleaming  earrings  and  bracelets.  Others 
vied  with  this  show  in  greasy  red  shakos,  faded  blouses,  and  other 
cast-off  equipments  of  soldiers  and  hunters.  So  the  parade  ran 
down  to  the  barest  loin  cloth  or  utter  nakedness,  through  leopard 
skin  wraps,  dirty  karosses,  ragged  breeches,  tattered  shirts,  and 
every  other  meagre  covering  of  the  native  hunter  or  shepherd. 
Some  of  this  drift  to  the  mines  tramped  more  than  a  thousand 
miles  over  mountain  ridges  and  sun-scorched  veld,  swimming 
through  rivers,  scrambling  down  steep  ravines,  and  plunging  deep 
in  mud  and  desert  sand,  to  reach  their  goal,  as  many  did,  gaunt 
skeletons  of  men,  with  bleeding  feet,  and  bodies  scratched  and 
sore  and  tottering  with  weariness  and  hunger.1 

Diamonds  were  no  temptation  to  them.  They  would  not 
have  walked  a  mile  to  pick  up  a  Koh-i-nur.  But  the  white  dia- 
mond seekers  were  willing  to  pay,  for  a  few  months'  hunting  for 
little  white  pebbles,  enough  to  buy  a  cheap  gun  and  a  bag  of 
powder  and  balls  —  most  precious  of  all  earthly  things  in  the 
eyes  of  a  roving  African.  Then  the  white  camps  were  lively, 
humming  social  resorts,  abounding  with  good  food  and  tempting 
drink,  where  black  men  were  welcome  and  well  protected.  So 
the  natives  swarmed  in  faster  and  faster  as  the  mining  progressed 
and  the  news  spread  to  distant  regions.  Some  of  this  swarm  could 
be  persuaded  to  remain  at  the  mines  for  a  year  or  more  and  work 
quite  steadily  ;  but  most  drifted  away,  at  the  end  of  a  few  months, 
or  as  soon  as  they  were  able  to  get  their  coveted  guns  and  powder 
pouches.  Thus  while  many  thousands  flocked  yearly  to  the  Fields 
from  their  opening,  the  outflow  kept  the  supply  from  swamping 
the  demand.  As  this  influx  from  the  dark  continent  met  and 
mingled  with  the  rush  from  the  outside  world  in  the  diamond- 
mine  workings  and  camps,  how  greatly  vivid,  unique,  and  stir- 
ring were  the  kaleidoscopic  shifts  of  this  strange  concourse ! 
Europe,  Asia,  Africa,  and  America  had  boiled  over  into  a  hotch- 
potch, splashed  on  a  diamond  bed  in  the  heart  of  South  Africa. 

1  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,  1872.  "South  Afri- 
can Diamond  Fields  and  Journey  to  Mines,"  William  James  Morton,  M.D.,  New 
York,  1877. 


CHAPTER   VII 


THE    GREAT    WHITE    CAMPS 

OW  quickly  and  marvellously  was  the  face  of 
the  little  South  African  stock  farms  transformed 
by  this  influx  !  Open  pasture  land,  where  the 
eye  saw  one  day  only  a  few  scattered  cattle 
browsing  on  the  thin  grass  and  scratching  their 
sides  against  a  stunted  camelthorn,  was  covered 
next  day  by  swarms  of  roving  prospectors,  with  shovels  and 
sieves,  upturning  grass  roots  and  shaking  dry  earth  through 
their  screens.  White  canvas  camps,  foaming  with  life,  rose  in  a 


Kimherley,  before  the  Discovery  of  Diamonds. 

night,  with  the  seeming  magic  of  Aladdin's  palace,  at  the  foot  of 
kopjes  where,  before,  a  burrowing  meerkat  was  the  only  tenant. 
Beyond  the  masses  of  tents  ranged  long  straggling  arches  of 
wagon  tops  and  tethered  troops  of  bullocks,  horses,  and  mules. 

190 


THE    GREAT   WHITE    CAMPS 


191 


Only  a  few  months  from  the  day  when  the  first  diamond  was 
picked  up  near  du  Toit's  pan,  the  camp  at  Dorstfontein  was 
proudly  claiming  the  title  of  the  "  City  of  the  Pan."  A  spacious 
market  square  was  laid  out  on  the  ground  between  the  pan 


Dutoitspan.     (From  a  very  early  Photograph.) 

and  the  ridge  covered  with  diamond  diggers,  and  around  this 
square  were  ranged  the  white  walls  of  the  aspiring  camp. 
Streets  radiating  from  the  central  square  gave  open  access  to  the 
market-place,  and  the  white  tent  blocks  were  soon  dotted  near 
the  square  with  shops  of  brick  and  iron  and  wood,  rivalling  the 
pioneer  diamond-digging  town  of  Klip-drift  on  the  Vaal.1 

Klip-drift  struggled  on  with  the  best  face  possible,  making 
much  of  its  position  of  vantage  as  the  distributing  market  of  all 
camp  supplies  from  the  South  African  Republic ;  but  its  day  of 
ascendancy  soon  flitted  away  never  to  return.  In  September, 
1871,  its  chief  standard-bearer,  the  Diamond  News,  moved  to 
the  "  City  of  the  Pan,"  and  there  was  no  question  from  that  time 
of  the  preeminence  of  the  "  dry  diggings,"  although  a  rival 
paper,  the  Diamond  Field,  bore  up  for  a  time  under  the  sinking 
fortunes  of  Klip-drift.  Before  the  end  of  the  year  1871, 
Dutoitspan  boasted  "  many  large  hotels,"  "  immense  stores," 

1  "  The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Charles  Alfred  Payton,  London, 
1872. 


192      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


THE    GREAT   WHITE   CAMPS  193 

two  churches,  a  hospital,  and  a  theatre,  and  might  have  men- 
tioned, besides,  its  less  distinguished  billiard  room,  "canteens," 
and  dance  halls.1  It  was  surely  a  wonderful  birth  of  a  smartly 
growing  infant  city  on  the  face  of  scrub-covered  prairie  in  the 
heart  of  South  Africa. 

The  rise  of  the  camps  at  De  Beers  and  Kimberley  was  even 
more  rapid  than  the  growth  of  the  camp  on  Dorstfontein  and 
Bultfontein  farms.  There  was  no  regular  working  in  the  De 
Beers  diggings  before  May,  1871,  but  the  diggers  could  buy 


Kimberley,  1873. 

Christmas  presents  that  year  in  rows  of  brick  and  iron  stores 
on  the  main  roadsides,  intermingled  with  "  hotels  "  and  saloons, 
and  a  great  white  canvas  town  was  spread  out  in  a  picturesque 
medley  of  tents  and  marquees,  straggling  far  over  the  veld,  and 
seeking  the  shelter  of  some  stubbornly  rooted  mimosa  or  camel- 
thorn.2  Kimberley's  growth  was  still  more  surprising.  Three 
months  after  the  rush  began,  the  Colesberg  Kopje  was  the  centre 
of  an  immense  encampment  in  whose  heart  streets  were  irregularly 
laid  out,  and  neat  stores  built  of  iron  and  brick.  In  December, 
1871,  there  were,  by  actual  count,  on  the  lower  street  of  Kim- 

1  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,  1872.  2  Ibid. 


i94      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

berley,  six   stores,  four   hotels,  and   several    butcher  and  shoe- 
maker shops,  besides  a  billiard  room  and  saloon.     On  the  upper 


Around  Kimberlcy  Mine,  1872. 

or  main  street  there  were  three  hotels,  several  diamond  merchants' 
offices,  a  wholesale  spirit  and  provision  store,  a  bakery  and  con- 
fectioner's shop,  a  drug  dispensary,  butchers'  shops,  eating  houses, 
bars,  club  and  billiard  rooms,  and  other  miscellaneous  shops  and 
resorts.  On  the  edge  of  these  white-walled  cities,  and  on  the 
slopes  of  all  the  neighboring  hills,  were  scattered  the  huts  of  wood 
or  dirty  canvas  or  mud-plastered  stones,  where  the  native  blacks 
huddled  together.  When  even  this  cover  was  lacking,  some 
slept  in  tents,  or  in  burrows  scraped  in  the  hillsides.  How  many 
diamond  seekers  were  massed  in  these  camps  at  the  height  of 
the  rush  can  hardly  be  reckoned  with  any  approach  to  exactness. 
There  may  have  been  fifty  thousand  whites  and  blacks  on  the 
Fields,  for  the  flow  to  Dutoitspan  is  said  to  have  mounted  as  high 
as  forty  thousand  shortly  after  the  opening  of  the  Vooruitzigt 
farm  mines. 


THE    GREAT    WHITE   CAMPS  195 

When,  after  long  weeks  of  plodding  over  rugged  mountain 
ranges,  parched  karroos,  and  rolling  prairie,  a  traveller  suddenly 
saw  rising  before  him  these  white  camps,  springing  up  like  pro- 
digious mushrooms  in  an  African  desert,  even  the  dullest  brain 
was  strangely  disturbed.  It  was  hard  to  realize  that  these  exotic 
plants  were  the  work  of  men's  hands,  for  they  seemed  rather  the 
fantastic  conceit  of  the  trance  of  an  opium  eater.  Here  were 
such  cities  as  the  mirage  shapes  from  clouds  or  as  Solomon 
might  have  built  with  the  help  of  his  docile  genii.  When  they 
lay  outstretched  and  gleaming  under  the  burning  sun  in  the 
full  splendor  of  noon,  they  were  weird  creations  to  amaze  the 
beholder ;  but  who  can  conceive  their  impress  at  night,  under 
the  towering  sky  dome  sprinkled  with  stars,  with  their  masses  of 


Around  Kimberley  Mine,  1872. 

twinkling  and  sparkling  lights  on  the  black  face  of  the  veld,  like 
the  tail  of  a  fallen  comet.1 

1  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,  1872.  "  To  the  Cape 
for  Diamonds,"  Frederick  Boyle,  1873.  "South  African  Diamond  Fields,"  Will- 
iam Jacob  Morton,  1877. 


196      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

Outside  of  these  three  main  camps  tents  were  thickly 
sprinkled  around  the  farmhouse  of  Bultfontein,  in  a  field  where 
a  thousand  diggers  were  at  work  in  the  first  week  of  the  rush, 
after  the  ground  was  opened  in  May,  1871.  Immediately  south 
of  this  diamond-bearing  farm  was  the  farm  Alexandersfontein, 
where  many  prospectors  were  also  turning  and  sifting  the  ground. 
By  the  determination  of  the  limits  of  Griqualand  West  these 
diggings,  as  well  as  the  chief  camps,  became  part  of  the  British 
Colonial  domain  ;  for  the  boundary  line  separating  the  new  Col- 
ony from  the  Orange  Free  State  ran  just  outside  of  this  cluster 
of  farms,  Vooruitzigt,  Dorstfontein,  Bultfontein,  and  Alexan- 
dersfontein,—  through  the  outlying  farm  of  Benaauwdheids- 
fontein,  where  no  diamond  mine  had,  as  yet,  been  discovered.1 
So  all  the  known  diamond  fields  of  South  Africa,  except  the 
lagersfontein  farm  within  the  bounds  of  the  Orange  Free  State 

•>      D 

and  the  shallow  Vaal  River  placers,  were  bunched  on  a  plateau 
four  thousand  feet  above  the  sea  level,  within  the  angle  formed 
by  the  junction  of  the  Vaal  with  the  Orange  River,  on  a  patch 
with  a  radius  of  1.72  miles  at  the  crossing  of  longitude  24°  46' 
east  of  Greenwich  with  latitude  28°  43'  south  of  the  equator. 

The  London  and  South  African  Exploration  Company,  by 
its  purchase  of  Dorstfontein,  Bultfontein,  and  Alexandersfontein, 
held  a  tight  grip  on  the  mineral  rights  comprehending  the  dia- 
monds on  all  these  farms,  and  leased  the  surface  diggings  under 
licenses  of  IDS.  for  every  claim  30  feet  square.  Messrs.  Dunell, 
Kbden  &  Co.,  of  Port  Elizabeth,  held  the  farm  of  Vooruitzigt, 
and  exacted  the  same  license  fee  for  working  claims  which  were 
laid  out  in  squares  30  by  30  Dutch  feet,  or  3 1  by  31  English 
feet.2  Outside  of  the  Colesberg  Kopje  or  Kimberley  mine  all 
the  diggings  were  at  first  a  jumble  of  holes,  pits,  and  burrows, 
with  no  attempt  to  secure  any  system  or  union  in  mining.  But 
the  objections  to  this  helter-skelter  opening  of  the  ground  were 
so  apparent  that  a  strict  reservation  of  roadways  to  give  access 
to  all  parts  of  the  surface  of  the  mine  was  insisted  upon  by  the 

1  "Diamonds  and  Gold  in  South  Africa,"  Theodore  Reunert,  1893. 

2  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,  1872. 


MMOND    MINKS    OF    SOI   !  H    AFRICA 

i-.f    these    three    main    camps    tents    were    thickly 

.•I'i-unJ  tiie  farmhouse  ot  Bulttuntein,  in  a  held  where 

•  iiggers  uere  at  work   in   rhe  first  week  ot  the  rush, 

u   around  was  opened  in  M:iv,  iSyj.     Immediately  south 

il'Hmoml-hv.irne  farm    was   thr  farm    Alexandersfontein, 

manv  prospectors  xscrealso  turning  and  sifting  the  ground. 

;-M;in.ir:(.n   oi   the   limits  of  (jriqualand   West  these 

,  as  \\e  1  a    rhe  chief   camps,  became  part  of  the   British 

•it  boundary  line  separating  the  new  Col- 

•  ^tate  ran  just  outside  of  this  cluster 

.'nmtein,    Bultfontein,  and   Alexan- 

nuiiying    tarm    of   Benaauwdheids- 

ine   had,  as  vet,  been  discovered.1 

h';-id>  of  South  Africa,  except  the 

"unds  of  the  Orange  Free  State 

.%:.uers,  were   bunched  on  a  plateau 

•  • .;  level,  within  the  angle  formed 
KIMBERLEY  MINE,.  1872^. 

Showing  Roadways  and  End  View  of  Excav;at»°^|Titude  24°  46' 

4;'  south  of  the  equator. 

.\;-";}n    (Exploration  Company,  by 

O':»  tontein,  and  Alexanderstontein, 

.  ;-;ii  i-ght^  comprehending  the  dia- 

;\i-;\{  rhe  surface  diggings  under 

square.      Messrs.  Dunell, 

•\rm  of  Vooruitzigt, 

4  claims  which  were 

}  i   by  3  i    Knglish 

')u'->  Kimberley  mine  all 

cs,  pits,  and  burrows, 

.•;mn  in  mining.      But 

'.  V'L1  of  the  ground  were 

"rivhvays  to  give  access 

v^a^  insisted  upon  by  the 

A  •     (.'      ?  - •••<-.'  l-.ip    Rcunert,  189-5. 


THE    GREAT   WHITE    CAMPS 


197 


Orange  Free  State  Inspector  of  Mines,  in  the  laying  out  of 
claims  on  the  Colesberg  Kopje.  His  authority  was  then  so  far 
recognized  that  his  direction  controlled  the  survey  and  opening, 
on  July  21,  1871,  of  the  diggings  since  famous  as  the  Kimberley 
Diamond  Mine. 

Roadways,  15  feet  in  width,  running  approximately  north 
and  south,  were  carried  across  the  longer  axis  of  the  diamond 
bed,  at  a  distance  of  47  feet  from  one  to  the  other.  Each  road 
cut  7^  feet  of  surface  ground  from  the  side  of  the  bordering 


Kimberley  Mine,  1872. 

claims,  so  that  the  working  surface  of  each  allotted  claim  was 
31  by  23-!-  feet.  Fourteen  of  these  roadways  crossed  the  mine, 
whose  ground  surface  permitted  the  laying  out  of  about  430 
claims  of  the  allotted  size,  3 1  feet  square.  A  great  many  more 
claims  had  been  granted  to  license-holders  before  the  survey, 
for  there  had  been  no  accurate  measurement  of  the  kopje,  and 
there  was  a  consequent  overlapping  and  conflict  of  locations  and 
spreading  of  claims  beyond  the  limits  of  the  diamond-bearing 
ground.  In  the  settlement  of  contests  the  claims  were  split  up 
by  concessions,  bargains,  and  sales,  until  there  were  not  less  than 
1600  separate  holdings  of  claims,  and  fractional  parts  running  as 
small  as  -j^-,  or  about  7  square  yards.  A  lucky  claim-holder 


198       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

would  sell  off  parts  of  his  claim  or  the  whole  at  high  prices ;  for 
bidders  were  ready  to  pay  large  premiums  beyond  the  license 
fee  of  IQS.  exacted  from  every  working  owner,  whether  his  claim 
was  full  size  or  a  paring.  The  competition  for  a  share  in  the 
riches  of  the  ground  was  only  less  keen  at  De  Beers,  and  there 
was  a  like  subdivision  of  claims  there,  and  not  infrequently  at 
Dutoitspan  and  Bultfontein.1 

It  was  obvious  from  the  start,  without  any  stretch  of  fore- 
sight, that  these  minute  subdivisions  of  claims  and  individual 
working  were  only  practicable  in  open  cuttings  whose  depth 
must  depend  on  the  character  of  the  ground  and  the  cooperation 
of  the  miners.  But  at  the  outset  of  the  mining  in  these  Fields 
no  one  could  forecast  the  unknown  continuance  in  depth  of  the 
diamond  deposits,  and  few  supposed  that  the  new  beds  differed 
essentially  from  any  before  uncovered,  and  were  vastly  more  im- 
portant than  the  shallow  gravel  wash  along  the  banks  of  the 
Vaal.  It  was  commonly  expected  that  some  barren  stratum 
would  be  reached  not  far  from  the  surface,  corresponding  to  the 
"  bed  rock  "  of  the  river  diggings,  and  that  this  must  terminate 
the  hope  of  the  diamond  seekers.2  So  the  rush  for  the  surface 
claims  was  the  keener,  in  view  of  the  belief  that  a  few  months' 
work  at  most  would  exhaust  the  precious  deposit,  and  nobody 
paused  to  consider  what  he  would  do  if  he  was  unable  to  sink 
an  open  pit  deeper. 

Beneath  the  red  surface  soil  at  Dutoitspan  a  thin  layer  of 
calcareous  tufa 3  had  been  exposed,  below  which  lay  the  dia- 
mond-bearing breccia  which  the  miners  called  "  yellow  ground  " 
from  its  prevailing  color.4  At  De  Beers  and  Kimberley  there 
was  comparatively  little  limestone  beneath  the  red  soil,  for  the 

1  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,  1872.          2  Ibid. 

3  I  look  upon  the   calcareous  tufa  which  covered  the  diamond  mines  as  only 
the  altered  yellow  ground  which  had  been  metamorphosed  by  the  evaporation  of 
water  highly  charged  with  carbonate  of  lime.       The  calcareous  tufa  which  covered 
the   Premier   mine  was  diamond    bearing.       This  is  the   only  one   of  the  mines 
whose    surface  ground  has  come  under  my  personal  observation.  —  The  Author. 

4  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,   1872. 


OF   THE 

UNIVERSITY 


THE    GREAT   WHITE    CAMPS  199 

rich  "  yellow  ground  "  rose  nearly  to  the  surface  under  a  thin 
coating  of  chalk.  It  appeared  in  exploring  the  yellow  ground  in 
most  of  the  openings  that  the  deposit  was  enclosed  in  an  oval- 
shaped  funnel  of  shale,  or  decomposed  basalt  resting  on  shale, 
which  the  miners  called  "  reef."  This  reef  contained  no  dia- 
monds and  marked  the  limits  of  any  profitable  prospecting. 
The  surface  area  of  the  yellow  ground  within  one  of  these  fun- 
nels ranged  from  about  ten  acres  at  Kimberley  to  twenty-three 
acres  at  Dutoitspan,  and  on  these  patches  all  the  diamond-bearing 
claims  of  the  Fields  were  located.1 

When  the  bottom  of  the  "  yellow  ground  "  was  reached  at  a 
depth  of  from  fifty  to  sixty  feet  below  the  surface,  it  was  sup- 
posed at  first  that  diamond  digging  in  the  funnels  had  come  to 
an  end ;  but  the  hard  underlying  rock  was  cut  by  experi- 
menters, and  it  was  found,  to  the  delight  of  the  miners,  that 
this  also  was  diamond  bearing.  It  was  a  breccia  composite, 
essentially  like  the  "  yellow  ground "  above,  but  much  more 
compact  and  hard,  and  of  a  prevailing  bluish  slate  color,  so 
that  it  was  familiarly  known  as  "  blue  ground."  Exposure  to 
the  air,  sun,  and  rain  decomposed  it  so  rapidly  that  most  of  the 
rock  could  be  readily  pulverized  after  a  few  weeks,  and  its 
precious  contents  extracted  by  sifting.  The  whole  mass  of  the 
ground  in  the  funnels  was  diamond-bearing,  in  greater  or  less 
extent,  except  in  occasional  streaks  and  masses  of  barren  shale, 
floating  reef,  floating  shale,  or  non-diamond-bearing  volcanic 
mud,  and  volcanic  rocks.  So  the  pit  sinking  was  widened  to 
the  extreme  limits  of  the  claims,  and  the  entire  area  of  yellow 
and  blue  ground  excavated  in  open  quarries. 

The  work  was  pushed  with  feverish  energy  and  remarkable 
rapidity  in  view  of  the  bare  hand  labor  and  crude  mining  appli- 
ances, but  there  was  no  uniformity  of  method  or  extended 
cooperation.  Every  claim-holder  cut  down  his  patch  with  pick 
and  shovel,  and  lifted  the  broken  ground  in  a  way  that  suited 
his  individual  notion.  Some  set  stout  windlasses  in  the  surface 
ground  near  the  edge  of  their  claims,  and  hoisted  buckets  filled 

1  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,  1872.          2  Ibid, 


200      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


THE    GREAT   WHITE    CAMPS  201 

on  the  working  levels.  Others  carried  up  buckets  and  tubs 
and  rawhide  sacks  to  the  surface,  climbing  ladders  resting  on 
successive  terraces,  or  mounting  flights  of  steps  cut  in  the  rock, 
or  trundling  wheelbarrows  up  plank  inclines.  Around  the  edge 
of  the  mines  there  was  a  mustering  of  carts,  and  barrows,  and 
carriers,  to  bear  off  the  quarried  ground  to  depositing  places, 
where  it  was  dried,  pounded,  and  sifted.1 

The  open  quarries,  swarming  with  workers,  buzzed  like  pro- 
digious beehives.  The  upsetting  of  the  tower  of  Babel  would 
scarcely  have  poured  out  such  a  medley  of  tongues  and  sounds. 
From  the  vast  amphitheatres  scooped  in  the  rock  there  rose  in 
the  air  the  clicking  of  picks,  the  rasp  and  clatter  of  shovels,  the 
cracking  of  rock,  the  rattle  of  gravel,  the  thud  of  bucket-filling, 
the  creaking  of  windlasses,  the  tramp  over  planks,  the  thump  of 
wheelbarrows,  the  rolling  of  carts,  the  lowing  of  bullocks  and 
braying  of  mules,  mingled  with  calls  and  chatter  and  chants 
of  whites  and  blacks  in  an  indescribable  din.  Diggers  in  rough 
working  dress,  and  natives  almost  stark  naked,  bent  and  heaved, 
and  scrambled  and  climbed,  side  by  side,  reeking  with  sweat 
and  grime,  in  an  ever  shifting,  restless  swarm  that  covered  the 
face  of  the  quarry  like  flies  in  some  monstrous  sugar  bowl.  The 
flocking  in  of  the  native  African  tribes — joined  with  the  white 
diamond  seekers  in  opening  the  strange  funnels  of  crystal- 
sprinkled  breccia  —  made  a  compound  of  color,  feature,  and 
character  never  before  assembled  in  any  mines  on  the  face  of 
the  earth.2  The  sinewy  negroes  proved  themselves  such  willing 
and  sturdy  workers  in  the  dust  and  heat  of  the  sun-scorched 
quarries,  that  the  claim-holders  were  glad  to  hire  them  and 
confine  their  own  work  to  the  task  of  overseers,  directing  the 
digging  and  hauling,  and  the  sifting  and  sorting.  No  blaze  of 
the  sun  and  no  whirl  of  the  dust  could  subdue  their  bubbling 
spirits,  breaking  out  in  wild  whoops  and  chants,  and  yelling  in 
pack  when  any  big  diamond  was  found,  revelling  in  every 
chance  diversion,  —  the  fall  of  a  bucket,  the  slip  of  a  ladder,  the 

1  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,  1872.  "South  Afri- 
can Diamond  Fields,"  Morton,  1877.  2  Ibid. 


202       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


THE 

R 

OF 


' 


THE    GREAT   WHITE    CAMPS 


203 


tumble  of  a  climber,  and  convulsed  with  laughter  whenever  they 
could  set  mules  capering,  or  bullocks  shying  or  balking  by  shrill 
whistles  and  screams,  and  mimicry  of  a  driver's  call:  "Yek!" 
and  "  Trek  !  "  "  Ah  now  !  "  and  "  Whoa  !  "  and  so  through  the 
range  of  cries,  Dutch,  English,  and  African.1 

Almost  all  the  natives  were  barefooted,  and  most  were  bare- 
headed, barebacked,  and  barelegged,  except  in  the  coldest  weather. 
Some  had  ragged  trousers,  and  others  ragged  shirts,  but  few  put 
both  on  together.  A  greasy,  gaudy  handkerchief  twisted  around 


Kimberley  Mine,  1872. 

a  black  head,  and  party-colored  bunches  of  rags,  or  moochies 
made  of  the  tails  or  skins  of  wild  animals,  dangling  from  a  waist- 
belt  of  rawhide,  were  a  camp  parade  dress  too  precious  to  use 
in  the  quarries.  Mingled  with  these  wild  Africans,  the  white 
miners  worked  soberly  and  arduously,  bearing  the  pains  of 
diamond  digging  stoically,  in  the  hope  of  its  rewards.  Their 
working  clothes  were  commonly  plain  suits  of  brown  corduroy 
or  other  coarse  cloth  adapted  to  the  season,  and  when  the  sun 
shone  they  wore  generally  broad-brimmed  straw  hats,  or  pith 
helmets,  with  light  muslin  "puggarees." 

It  was  long  before  there  was  any  notable  advance  in  the  pro- 

1  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,  1872.          2  Ibid. 


204      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

cess  of  separation  of  the  diamonds  from  the  ground,  beyond  the 
cradle  for  dry  sifting,  constructed  to  take  the  place  of  the  com- 
mon hand-sieve  at  Dutoitspan.  Level  spots  were  sought  on 
the  veld  near  the  mines,  or  patches  of  ground  were  levelled 
sufficiently  to  serve  as  dumping  places,  where  the  broken  dia- 
mond-bearing breccia  was  piled  and  spread  out.  The  "blue 
ground  "  exposed  to  the  air  crumbled  away  by  degrees,  but  the 
miners  were  rarely  patient  enough  to  wait  for  this  disintegration, 
preferring  quick  returns  by  pulverizing  the  ground  with  their 
shovels  and  mallets.  This  was  hard  work  and  costly,  from  the 
loss  in  imperfect  pulverization.  But  the  diamond  seekers  were 


Roads  in  Kimberley  Mine,  1871-1872. 

poor  men  who  could  scarcely  afford  to  hold  any  stock  of  blue 
ground  for  the  sake  of  increased  returns,  even  if  they  had  been 
able  to  guard  their  depositing  floors  from  theft.  After  pound- 
ing the  broken  rock  it  was  sifted  in  the  midst  of  dust  clouds  by 
rockers  swung  on  riems  of  rawhide,  and  the  concentrate  was 
then  scraped  over  and  sorted.1  In  July,  1871,  a  large  cylindri- 
cal revolving  sieve,  driven  by  a  small  steam  engine,  was  put  at 
work  by  some  American  miners,  and  this  sifting  machine  was 
said  to  be  an  efficient  and  rapid  separator.  The  pulverized 
ground  was  thrown  into  the  upper  end  of  the  screen,  which  was 

1  "South  African  Diamond  Fields,"  Morton,  1877.      "Diamonds  and  Gold 
in  South  Africa,"  Reunert,   1893. 


THE    GREAT   WHITE    CAMPS 


205 


rapidly  revolved,  and  the  concentrate  passed  out  through  the 
lower  end,  falling  upon  a  sorting  table.  The  cylinder,  covered 
with  fine  wire  mesh,  sifted  out  the  dust  thoroughly,  and  its  opera- 
tion was  so  rapid  that  thirty  cartloads  of  diamond-bearing  ground 
were  screened  daily.  Its  owners  claimed  to  be  able  to  sift  all 
the  ground  in  a  claim  thirty  feet  square  to  a  uniform  depth  of 
thirty  feet  in  three  weeks.  The  machine  attracted  a  curious 
crowd  at  first,  when  the  steam  whistle  blew  off  and  the  cylinder 
began  to  throw  off  thick  clouds  of  dust,  but  for  some  reason  its 

o  • 


Kimberley  Mine.     (Showing 


racks  appear  in  the  foreground.) 


use  was  not  long  continued.  Probably  the  fine  mesh  was  too 
light  to  bear  the  strain  and  friction  of  the  revolving  rock 
fragments.1 

The  amount  of  ground  which  any  one  man  could  work,  was, 
of  course,  very  small,  but  there  were  so  many  workers  on  the 
Fields  that  the  aggregate  extent  of  ground  sifted  was  enormous, 
and  the  breccia  in  spots  was  so  thickly  sprinkled  with  crystals 
that  many  miners  won  rich  rewards.  When  Payton  was  leav- 
ing the  field  in  November,  1871,  it  was  estimated  that  from 
forty  to  fifty  thousand  pounds'  worth  of  diamonds  were  taken 
1  "  The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,  1872. 


206       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

weekly  from  the  Colesberg  Kopje  alone,  and  he  states  that  the 
best  claims  had  risen  in  value  from  ^100  or  less  to  ^4000. l 

It  was  clearly  shown,  too,  that  even  the  highest  price  paid 
for  a  claim  might  be  cheap,  for  one  poor  Dutchman,  "  Smuts," 
who  bought  half  a  claim  for  ^50,  is  said  to  have  found  dia- 
monds in  two  months'  working  to  the  value  of  ^£1 5,000  or 
more.  Another  digger  found,  in  a  few  months,  no  less  than 
730  stones  in  his  claim,  one  of  which  weighed  156  carats." 
Such  great  good  fortune  was  rare  in  the  other  mines,  and  many 
miners  won  little  or  nothing  from  months  of  hard  work  in  their 
claims,  but  in  the  Colesberg  Kopje,  or  Kimberley  mine,  the 
prizes  were  so  common  and  exciting  that  every  foot  of  ground 
was  covered  by  diamond  seekers.  When  the  rubbing  of  shoul- 
ders was  too  close  for  comfort,  one  or  more  of  the  partners  in 
a  claim  would  be  pressed  to  sell  out  and  start  again  prospect- 
ing. Sometimes  a  share  in  a  claim,  worth  many  hundreds  of 
pounds,  would  be  risked  on  the  toss  of  a  penny.8 

In  the  heat  of  the  search  and  extraction  many  fine  diamonds 
were  fractured,  and  many  of  the  smaller  stones  ran  through  the 
sieves  into  the  tailings,  as  was  afterward  demonstrated  when 
the  waste  heaps  were  reworked  with  better  appliances.4  The 
Kimberley  mine  produced  some  stones  of  large  size,  running 
sometimes  over  one  hundred  carats,  but  the  mass  of  crystals  ran 
under  five  carats.  A  yellowish  tinge  was  more  marked  in  the 
diamonds  of  the  uplands  than  in  the  river  stones,  and  many 
otherwise  superb  crystals  were  so  decidedly  "  off  color  "  that 
their  value  was  greatly  impaired. 

It  was  early  noticed  that  the  diamonds  of  one  mine  often 
differed  materially  from  those  of  another,  and  even  in  the  same 
mine  diamonds  of  one  section  were  unlike  the  yield  of  another. 
Thus,  in  the  west  end  of  the  Kimberley  mine  the  diamond  crys- 
tals were  exceptionally  perfect  octahedrons,  or  exceptionally  white 
"  glassy  stones,"  as  the  miners  called  them  ;  while  elsewhere  in 
the  mine  the  crystals  had,more  commonly,  rounded  and  bevelled 

1  "  The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,   1872.      2  Ibid.      8  Ibid. 
4  "Diamonds  and  Gold  in  South  Africa,"  Reunert,  1893. 


THE    GREAT    WHITE   CAMPS 


207 


2o8      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

edges,  and,  more  or  less,  a  yellowish  tinge,  and  there  was  a  large 
proportion  of  split,  flawed,  and  spotted  stones,  and  boart.  The 
De  Beers  mine  crystals  resembled  the  Kimberley  stones,  but 
their  quality  ran  a  little  below  the  Kimberley  mine.  Dutoitspan 
produced  comparatively  few  stones,  but  the  average  weight  was 
notably  large,  and  the  crystals  were  of  fine  color.  Bultfontein 
stones  differed  greatly  from  those  of  the  other  mines.  Here 
the  diamonds  were  chiefly  small,  rounded  octahedrons,  many  of 
them  so  pocked  and  spotted  that  the  crystals  had  a  cloudy 
appearance.1  These  crystals  were  greatly  inferior  to  the  "  glassy 
stones "  of  Kimberley  or  the  large  diamonds  of  Dutoitspan  ; 
but  the  Bultfontein  surface  ground  yield  was  so  uniform  at 
first,  that  many  diggers  held  and  worked  claims  for  the  sake  of 
sure,  if  small,  returns  to  defray  their  expenses,  while  they  counted 
on  their  Dutoitspan  claims  for  the  occasional  large  stones  that 
richly  rewarded  a  lucky  digger. 

All  the  crystals  in  the  blue  ground  were  encased  in  a  smooth 
bed  of  the  same  material  which  did  not  adhere  to  the  diamonds, 
so  that  their  lustre,  when  extracted,  was  quite  bright  or  glassy. 
Amid  the  mass  of  white  and  light  yellowish  stones  in  all  the 
mines  were  scattered  some  of  varied  color.  Brown  was  the 
most  common  of  these ;  next  came  the  deeper  yellow  shades, 
and  pale  blue  stones  were  sometimes  uncovered,  as  well  as  the 
black  diamond  (boart)  used  for  setting  drill-crowns.  Pink, 
mauve,  and  green  diamonds  were  occasionally  found,  but  were 
less  common  than  in  the  river  diggings. 

As  already  mentioned,  it  has  been  estimated  that  the  rush 
which  built  up  these  mining  camps  and  covered  the  surround- 
ing farms  with  prospectors  brought  fifty  thousand  men  to  the 
new  Diamond  Fields  in  the  first  year,  though  the  shifting  popu- 
lation of  the  Fields  did  not  rise  as  high  as  that  at  any  one  time.2 
The  influx  of  native  Africans  was  not  so  large  at  first,  but 
increased  from  year  to  year.  Morton  says  that  there  was  a  flow 
of  thirty  thousand  natives  annually  to  the  field  for  seven  years 

l"  South  African  Diamond  Fields,"  Morton,   1877. 

2  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,  1872. 


THE    GREAT   WHITE    CAMPS  209 

after  the  discovery  of  the  mines.1  This  is  a  credible  estimate,  at 
least,  in  view  of  the  constant  drifting  away  from  the  field  of  the 
native  workers,  after  a  few  months'  stay,  when  they  had  earned 
sufficient  money  to  buy  their  coveted  guns  and  ammunition,  and 
wives,  cattle,  blankets,  etc. 

The  bulk  of  the  general  merchandise  was  hauled  slowly  from 
the  coast  ports  in  ox-wagons.  Algoa  Bay  (Port  Elizabeth)  was 
the  chief  port  of  supply  at  first,  and  the  transport  to  the  Dia- 
mond Fields  was  a  trip  ranging  from  thirty  days,  at  least,  to  six 
months.2  Certain  kinds  of  food  —  beef,  mutton,  poultry,  game, 
dried  venison,  commonly  called  "biltong,"3  and  maize  meal 
(mealie  meal)  —  were  furnished  quite  cheaply  and  plentifully  from 
the  neighboring  Free  State  and  the  South  African  Republic, 
through  the  Klip-drift  distributing  market.  Tobacco,  butter, 
eggs,  and  honey  were  less  freely  supplied  from  the  country,  and 
commanded  a  ready  sale.  Ordinary  beef  and  mutton  sold  for 
4<^.  a  pound  in  1871,  with  an  additional  charge  for  choice  steaks. 
A  whole  sheep  could  be  bought  at  wholesale  for  4^.  Game, 
chiefly  springbok,  blesbok,  and  wildebeest,  was  as  cheap  as 
mutton.  Chickens  and  ducks  ranged  from  2s.  6d.  to  3^.  6d. 
apiece.  The  price  of  eggs  ran  high,  ranging  from  2s.  6d.  to  4-$-. 
a  dozen,  and  butter  was  sold  at  from  is.  6d.  to  5^.  per  pound. 
For  "  Boer  meal,"  a  coarse  wheat  flour,  the  charge  was  from 
35.$-.  to  50^.  per  muid,  about  183  pounds  ;  white  flour  brought  6d. 
a  pound;  rice  9^.;  sugar  and  tobacco  9^.  to  is. ;  oranges  and 
onions  were  sold  at  los.  per  hundred,  and  dried  fruits  at  from 
%d.  to  gd.  per  pound.4 

The  most  urgent  calls  were  for  fresh  vegetables,  and  the 
supply  was  so  meagre  that  the  prices  shot  up  to  exorbitant  fig- 
ures. From  5^-.  to  js.  was  freely  given  for  a  bucketful  of 
potatoes,  and  the  wholesale  price  for  a  bag  of  a  hundredweight 

1  "South  African  Diamond  Fields,"  Morton,  1877. 

2  "  The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,  1872. 

3  Biltong  is  made  of  meat  of  any  of  the  antelope  species,  but  that  made  from 
the  springbok  is  considered  the  best. 

4  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,  1872. 


210       THE    DIAMOND    MINES  OF    SOUTH    AFRICA 

was  from  ^2  to  £1  IQJ.  Half  a  crown  (sixty  cents)  was  often 
paid  for  a  small  cabbage  or  a  handful  of  onions.  Choice  forage 
for  the  horses  and  mules  was  almost  as  costly  as  vegetables.  A 
bundle  of  five  pounds  of  unthreshed  oat  hay  was  sold  for  as  high 
as  is.  Dry  cut  fuel  was  as  high-priced  as  forage.  Bundles  of 
light  sticks  sold  from  gd.  to  is.  per  bundle,  and  £3  was  charged 
for  a  load  of  good  firewood.  There  was  a  considerable  forest 
growth  on  the  hills  near  the  Vaal  River,  and  many  thickets 
on  the  ridges  nearer  the  camps,  but  the  cost  of  cutting  and  haul- 
ing was  so  great  that  many  diggers  contrived  to  make  their  fires 
of  dried  bullocks'  dung  (buffalo  chips  as  they  were  called  by  the 
emigrants  crossing  the  American  plains),  as  they  had  learned  to 
do  when  crossing  the  karroo.1 

Market  auctions  were  the  common  and  popular  mode  of 
selling  food  and  ordinary  miners'  supplies.  Criers  swinging  bells 
rang  up  the  drowsy  camps  for  the  early  morning  market,  where 
meat,  eggs,  butter,  fruit,  and  vegetables  were  offered  from  wagons 
and  stalls  in  the  open  market  squares.  These  sales  and  gather- 
ings of  bidders  and  lookers-on  formed  one  of  the  liveliest  camp 
scenes,  especially  on  Saturday,  when  thousands  of  whites  and 
blacks  flocked  to  the  auctions,  surrounding  the  stands  with  dense 
masses  of  jovial  bargainers.  How  strange  and  curious  to  a 
newcomer's  eye  was  the  market  show,  —  carcasses  of  big  brown 
shaggy  wildebeests  hanging  up  in  line  with  sides  of  beef,  ante- 
lopes with  slender  legs  stretched  out  stiffly  among  the  slaughtered 
sheep  and  lambs,  strips  of  biltong  and  freshly  killed  kids, 
little  long-legged  hares,  party-colored  bustards,  red-wing  par- 
tridges, red-legged  plovers,  guinea  fowl,  ducks,  geese,  and  other 
wild  fowl,  mingled  with  the  poultry  from  country  farmyards ! 
Here  were  lines  of  huge  tent-covered  wagons  filled  with  hides, 
and  wool,  and  meal,  and  wood,  driven  to  market  by  the  stolid 
Boers  or  Hottentot  servants  grinning  from  ear  to  ear.  Potatoes, 
and  beets,  and  carrots,  and  onions,  and  cabbages  were  piled  in 
heaps,  tempting  the  last  shilling  of  scurvy-haunted  men.  The 
gobbling  of  turkeys,  the  crowing  of  cocks,  the  quacking  of 

1  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,  1872. 


THE    GREAT   WHITE    CAMPS  211 

ducks,  swelled  the  chorus  of  chatter  and  laughing  and  singing 
and  badinage,  that  smothered,  at  times,  the  brisk  calls  of  the 
auctioneers  and  the  offers  of  the  diggers  and  the  hotel  and  shop 
keepers.1 

In  the  afternoons  special  sales  of  tents,  miners'  tools,  guns, 
and  general  merchandise  were  frequently  made  by  auction,  and 
large  stocks  were  sometimes  sold  off  completely  in  this  way. 
Often  in  the  flurry  of  competition  these  goods  brought  absurdly 
high  prices,  when  the  market  was  overstocked  with  like  articles 


Market  Square,  Kimberley. 

in  the  stores.  It  was  observed  as  a  curious  fact  that  scarcely  a 
bid  could  be  got  for  revolvers,  which  many  adventurers  had  sup- 
posed to  be  an  indispensable  part  of  their  outfit.  There  were 
very  few  outbreaks  of  ruffianism  in  the  camps,  where  the  great 
body  of  miners  was  disposed  to  be  orderly,  and  occasional  sprees 
were  the  chief  disturbances.  The  swaggering  bullies,  and  cheat- 

DO  O  ' 

ing  gamblers,  and  lurking  garroters,  who  infested  the  seething 
camps  of  Nevada  and  Colorado,  rarely  drifted  as  far  as  these 
isolated  Diamond  Fields,  and  the  few  who  came  in  were  held  in 
check. 

1  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,  1872. 


212      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


THE    GREAT    WHITE    CAMPS  213 

The  crying  need  of  the  camps  was  good  water.  The  Du- 
toitspan  basin  did  not  always  hold  out  through  the  dry  season, 
and  besides,  this  pan  was  filled  by  drainage  and  was  not  whole- 
some ;  but  two  rude  dams  were  built  that  served  to  store  up 
drainage  water  longer  than  the  natural  reservoirs.  To  eke  out 
the  supply  the  "  Diggers'  Committee  "  at  Dutoitspan  and  Bult- 
fontein  sunk  several  wells  which  furnished  some  additional  water, 
and  a  digger  was  licensed  to  draw  two  bucketfuls  daily  upon  the 
payment  of  one  shilling  a  month  for  his  water  rights.  This 
privilege  was  so  keenly  sought  for  that  there  was  always  a  little 
crowd  of  men  with  buckets,  waiting  their  turn,  at  the  mouth  of 
a  well  in  the  daytime.  The  water  was  muddy,  but  it  was  never- 
theless eagerly  drunk,  and  the  stinted  supply  was  too  precious 
for  washing.  Following  this  push  of  the  committee,  prospecting 
water  shafts  were  sunk  by  private  enterprise,  and  when  water  was 
reached,  the  well  was  opened  to  a  limited  number  of  subscribers 
upon  payment  of  a  monthly  fee  of  four  shillings.1 

At  Kimberley,  water,  for  months,  was  so  dear  that  it  was  sold 
for  threepence  a  bucket,  and  a  daily  washing  of  face  and  hands 
was  a  stretch  of  luxury.  A  stinted  bath  at  Dutoitspan  cost  two 
shillings  and  sixpence,  and  bathing  at  the  other  camps  was 
rarely  attempted.  When  the  coating  of  grime  grew  unbearable, 
the  best  resource  was  a  ride  or  tramp  to  the  Vaal  and  a  plunge 
in  the  river.  In  the  dry  season,  when  the  air  was  full  of  float- 
ing dust  from  the  claims  and  cradles,  and  when  hot  winds  from 
the  veld  blew  in  clouds  of  red  sand,  the  dearth  of  water  was 
bitterly  felt,  and  no  joker  was  safe  who  ventured  to  recall  the 
"  old  oaken  bucket "  and  other  vain  visions  of  cool,  bubbling 
springs. 

Often  the  dust-storms  passed  beyond  the  aggravation  of 
thirst  and  discomfort,  driving  sand-whirls  so  furiously  in  the 
faces  of  the  workers  that  the  hardiest  men  were  forced  to  drop 
their  picks  and  shovels,  and  buckets  and  cradles,  and  run  to 
cover.  Then,  for  hours,  storms  would  rack  the  tents,  straining 
every  cord  and  stitch  of  canvas  to  the  snapping  point,  and  often 

1  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,  1872. 


2i4      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

tearing  rents  in  the  walls,  or  pitching  over  tent-poles  and  all  in 
utter  wreck.  Even  when  the  stout  posts,  braced  and  guyed 
against  a  hurricane,  bore  the  strain  unyielding,  the  sheltered 
miners  had  to  swelter  in  a  mist  of  dust  that  was  blown  through 
the  crevices  into  every  fold  of  bedding  and  clothing,  and  coated 
every  inch  of  their  skins  with  irritating  powder. 

Next  to  this  pest  of  dust  was  the  plague  of  flies,  little  and 
large,  black  and  green,  that  swarmed  over  the  camps  in  countless 
myriads  in  the  summer  season,  tainting  every  morsel  of  food,  and 
settling  on  every  bare  face  or  body  with  a  dash  so  bold  and  per- 
sistent, and  a  grip  so  malignant,  that  it  hurt  like  a  sting.  No 
possible  device  could  clear  the  tents  completely,  or  keep  out 
these  swarms ;  but  the  miners  armed  themselves  with  big  whisks 
of  wildebeest  and  ox  tails,  and  got  some  relief  by  constantly  flick- 
ing and  slashing,  or  when  they  were  forced  to  use  both  hands 
at  work  on  the  cradles  or  sorting  tables,  "  fly  flappers  "  stood  by 
to  brush  back  attacks. 

Hot  days  in  the  dry  diggings  on  the  bare  veld  were  more 
keenly  felt  than  the  same  days  on  the  tree-fringed  Vaal,  and 
some  midsummer  days  were  too  scorching  even  for  the  endurance 
of  the  seasoned  black  diggers.  But,  except  at  midday,  few  work- 
ing hours  were  lost  when  the  sun  was  shining.  The  swooping 
thunder-storms  were  scarcely  less  terrific  than  the  storms  in  the 
river  valley,  striking  the  camps  with  drenching  pelts  of  rain  and 
heavy  hail,  hurled  from  cloud  banks  blazing  and  bellowing  with 
monstrous  forks  of  lightning  and  stunning  thunder  peals. 

The  clear  winter  days  were  greatly  invigorating.  At  break 
of  day  it  was  often  so  cold  that  jugs  of  water  were  skimmed 
with  ice  and  a  hoar  frost  covered  the  ground.  But  when  the 
bright  sun  mounted  the  sky,  the  chill  air  was  so  warmed  in  a 
few  hours,  and  so  pure  on  the  breezy  veld,  that  the  miners 
gained  fresh  spirit  with  every  breath,  and  went  through  their 
monotonous  round  of  work  with  unflagging  life  and  good  humor. 
The  actual  record  of  a  week  at  the  mines,  in  August,  1871,  gives 
a  clear  idea  of  the  winter  shifts  of  temperature.1 

1  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,  1872. 


THE    GREAT   WHITE    CAMPS  215 

DAY.  NIGHT. 

Highest  Temperature.  Lowest  Temperature. 

Aug.  21      83°  Fah 40°  Fah. 

"     22     85°    " 35°    " 

"   23   83°  •• 30°  " 

"     24     92°    "          ......  33°    " 

<<     25     93°    '• 28°    " 

<<     26     56°    « 28°    " 

The  health  of  the  camps  was  usually  good,  except  in  mid- 
summer, when  "  low  "  fever,  diarrhoea,  dysentery,  and  colic  were 
prevalent.  The  impure  drinking  water  was  the  most  persistent 
cause  of  sickness  and  the  most  difficult  to  combat.  Inflamma- 
tion of  the  lungs  from  the  fretting  dust,  and  mild  scurvy,  were 
the  other  common  ailments,  occasioned  by  the  conditions  of  life 
at  the  diggings.1 

It  was  not  all  work  and  no  play  in  these  diamond  diggings. 
Saturday  afternoon  was  commonly  taken  as  a  half  holiday  in 
addition  to  the  Sunday  rest  and  recreation.  In  the  springtime, 
or  the  beginning  of  the  rainy  season,  fresh  flowers  sprang  into 
bloom  on  the  face  of  the  veld,  and  birds  built  their  nests  in  the 
grass  and  thickets.  Little  dusky  black-and-white  birds,  recall- 
ing the  English  linnet,  were  sweetly  trilling  songsters,  and  were 
so  fearless  and  sociable  that  they  flew  everywhere  over  the  dig- 
gings, in  the  midst  of  the  dust  and  stir,  perching  on  heaps  of 
broken  rock,  or  even  on  the  diggers'  cradles,  comically  fluttering 
their  tails,  and  chirping  so  musically  that  the  wearied  men  were 
charmed  to  watch  and  listen.  There  was  good  shooting,  too,  for 
wild  fowl  and  small  game  on  the  open  veld ;  and  not  far  from 
Dutoitspan  there  was  a  large  stretch  of  thickets  and  scrub  where 
korhaans  and  paauws  and  partridges  and  plovers  and  hares 
abounded.  The  stately  Kafir  cranes  shook  their  bluish  gray 
plumes  on  the  brink  of  the  vleis,  or  water  holes,  where  they 
came  to  drink,  and  were  shot  by  the  hunters  who  lay  in  wait. 
Their  flesh  was  not  unpalatable  as  a  change  from  biltong,  but 

1<rThe  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Pay  ton,  1872.  "To  the 
Cape  for  Diamonds,"  Frederick  Boyle,  1873. 


2i6      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

the  hunters  who  pushed  toward  the  Vaal  brought  back  better 
eating  than  cranes  in  their  bags,  —  wild  ducks  and  geese  and 
guinea  fowl,  and  even  a  nimble  springbok  or  queer-headed  wilde- 
beest or  hartebeest.  The  swift  leopard,  too,  was  occasionally 
shot  near  the  river  bank,  and  the  rambling  diggers  found  some 
fun  in  unearthing  porcupines,  or  chasing  a  jackal  with  dogs,  or 
lying  in  wait  for  the  shy  head  of  a  meerkat  to  pop  out  of  a 
hole.  A  string  offish,  that  could  readily  be  caught  in  the  river, 
made  a  welcome  meal ;  and  a  run  to  the  Vaal,  with  a  few  days' 
camping  under  the  willows  and  long  swims  in  the  swirling 
current,  was  a  gay  streak  of  diversion  from  dusty  diamond 
digging.1 

Within  the  camping  grounds  there  were  always,  in  the  day- 
time and  evening,  stirring  scenes  to  attract  the  eye,  —  antics  of 
ponies  and  mules ;  the  passage  of  straining  bullock  teams  with 
carts  piled  high  with  diamond-bearing  ground,  or  wagons  loaded 
with  country  produce;  the  rambling  of  pedlers  with  packs 
and  trays;  the  groups  of  native  tribesmen  in  trappings  of  skins 
and  feathers  or  comical  old  clothing,  chattering  or  singing  or 
whooping  or  dancing ;  the  clustering  of  black  women,  washing 
on  the  edge  of  the  water  pools  ;  the  rallies  of  amateur  minstrels 
and  travelling  shows ;  the  merry-go-round,  ridden  by  laughing 
children  or  solemn  country  clowns  ;  the  rattling  of  pins  in  the 
bowling  alleys  and  clicking  of  balls  on  pool  tables,  the  crowded 
"  canteens,"  and  all  the  other  lively  sights  and  sounds  of  the 
fermenting  camps. 

Fortune-tellers  and  wizards,  who  professed  to  be  able  to  see 
through  the  earth,  did  not  need  to  dig  diamonds.  Credulous 
prospectors  filled  their  laps  with  silver  and  gold.  Payton  tells 
of  one  whose  tent  in  Dutoitspan  was  thronged,  day  and  night, 
with  eager  dupes,  showering  shillings  upon  her,  and  her  income 
was  reckoned  at  £30  a  day.  Many  of  the  Boers  had  unshak- 
able faith  in  her.  When  she  told  a  poor  Dutchman  that  there 
was  nothing  in  his  claim,  he  could  not  be  persuaded  to  dig  any 
longer.  If  she  promised  diamonds  and  none  were  found,  she 

1  "  The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,  1872. 


THE    GREAT    WHITE    CAMPS 


217 


had  an  easy  defence :  "  The  niggers  must  have  stolen  them." 
Then  the  wrathful  claim-holder  would  pounce  on  his  Kafirs  and 
haul  them  to  the  "  tronk,"  the  police  station  of  the  camp,  where 
the  blacks  were  searched  to  the  tips  of  their  toes.  Sometimes  the 
wizard  guessed  right,  for  diamond  stealing  was  common,  and 
precious  stones  would  be  brought  to  light  with  joy  to  the  owner 
and  credit  to  the  fortune-teller.1 

The  whipping-post  was  soon  set  up  in  the  new  camps  and 
freely  used  to  chastise  theft  and  other  offences.     The  whipping 


Natives  resting,  on  their  Way  to  the  Mines. 

was  not  very  severe,  and  it  was  remarked  that  the  "  cat "  was  not 
as  heavy  as  the  one  at  Klip-drift.  Many  of  the  natives  would 
steal  anything  that  they  could  carry  off,  and  put  on  a  brazen 
face  that  would  impose  on  a  police  court  judge.  A  story  is  told 
of  two  Hottentots  who  took  the  sheepskins  off  a  man's  bed  and 
tried  to  sell  them  back  to  their  owner  as  soon  as  his  eyes  were 
open  in  the  morning.  They  took  fifteen  lashes  on  their  bare 
backs  without  a  whimper.  Small  fines  were  imposed  for  slighter 
breaches  of  the  camp  regulations,  and  roaring  drunkards  were 
occasionally  clapped  into  the  "tronk,"  a  weak  little  jail,  but  the 

1  "The  Diamond  Diggings  of  South  Africa,"  Payton,  1872. 


218      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

whipping-post  was  necessarily  the  main  dependence  for  punish- 
ment of  natives. 

Strangest  and  most  interesting  of  all  features  of  the  camps  to 
a  newcomer  were  the  habits  and  antics  of  the  marvellous  collec- 
tion of  savages,  streaming  into  the  Fields  from  the  heart  of 
Africa.  No  mining  camp  on  earth  before  ever  held  such  a  mot- 
ley swarm  of  every  dusky  shade,  in  antelope  skins  and  leopard 
skins  and  jackal  skins  and  bare  skins,  —  with  girdles  and  armlets 
of  white  ox-tails,  and  black  crane  plumes  and  gorgeous  bird 
feathers,  and  dirty  loin  cloths,  and  ragged  breeches,  and  battered 
hats  and  tattered  coats.  With  and  without  the  fire  of  rum  they 
might  dash  off  at  any  moment  into  some  wildly  whirling  reel 
or  savage  dance,  gabbling  in  a  hundred  dialects,  whooping  with 
weird  cries,  and  chanting  plaintive,  gay,  and  passionate  strains, 
now  dissonant,  now  sweet.  Whenever  a  new  party  of  "  raw  " 
natives  came  in  from  the  wilderness,  weary,  grimy,  hungry,  shy, 
trailing  along  sometimes  with  bleeding  feet  and  hanging  heads, 
and  bodies  staggering  with  faintness,  a  howl  of  jeers  was  a  com- 
mon greeting,  and  a  pelting  with  rotten  fruits  and  stones  was 
likely  to  follow  the  scared  troop  up  the  street  of  the  camp, 
though  the  natives  were  not  churlish  at  heart,  and  might,  after- 
ward, share  their  last  crust  with  the  strangers. 

Their  savage  habits  clung  to  them  long  in  camp.  Some 
delighted  to  smoke  in  the  old  native  way,  by  making  a  little 
funnel  in  the  wet  ground  with  a  slender  stick  and  sucking  the 
smoke  through  one  end  while  the  tobacco  leaves  burned  in  a 
hollow  at  the  other.  As  a  rule  all  the  natives  from  Delagoa 
Bay  and  districts  to  the  north  of  that  part  smoked  cigars  with 
the  fire  end  in  their  mouths.  When  sheep  or  bullocks  were 
killed  at  market,  the  natives  hung  about  and  returned  exulting 
if  the  obliging  butchers  gave  them  the  entrails  to  hang  in  fes- 
toons about  their  necks  and  carry  off  smeared  with  filth.  They 
fed  content  day  after  day  on  a  few  handfuls  of  mealies  or  ground 
maize  with  an  occasional  chunk  of  refuse  meat.  They  had 
little  use  for  water  except  to  drink,  and  they  much  preferred 
Cape  brandy.  After  working  all  day,  and  roving  about  and 


THE    GREAT   WHITE    CAMPS 


219 


singing  at  night,  they  could  sleep  as  soon  as  their  heads  touched 
the  ground,  on  the  bare  earth,  without  shelter,  or  in  a  squalid 
hut  with  a  dirty  sheepskin  wrapped  around  them.  These  quaint 
Africans,  mingling  in  a  kaleidoscopic  show  with  adventurers 
coming  from  the  ends  of  the  earth,  made  a  unique,  moving 
drama  on  the  stage  of  the  Diamond  Fields  that  cannot  be 
forgotten  by  any  spectator. 


PHOTOGRAPH   OF  HERBERT  RHODES  MENTIONED  ON   PAGE  273. 


CHAPTER   VIII 


OPENING    THE    CRATERS 

N  ever  present  danger  hung  over  the  miners 
from  the  very  outset  of  their  pit  digging  in  the 
diamond-bearing  funnels.  The  yellow  ground 
was  a  breccia  so  loose  and  friable  that  it  was 
constantly  caving  in  upon  the  heads  of  the 
diggers.  Then  the  pits  were  sunk  so  close 
together  that  the  walls  gave  way  and  slipped,  crumbling  into  the 
claims  below.  A  loaded  cart,  passing  along  the  edge  of  a  road, 
would  often  topple  over  and  sometimes  plunge  with  driver  and 
mule  into  the  pit  below. 

Prospecting  on  the  Alexandersfontein  farm  was  not  long  con- 
tinued ;  but  the  diggings  at  Dutoitspan,  Bultfontein,  De  Beers, 
and  Kimberley  were  ardently  opened  by  swarms  of  diamond 
seekers.  The  surface  area  covered  by  claims  was  very  much 
larger  than  the  diamond-yielding  ground,  whose  total  extent 
was,  approximately,  seventy  acres.  When  the  claims  were  con- 
solidated by  purchase,  many  years  later,  the  Kimberley  open 
mine  surface  was  figured  to  be  33  acres;  De  Beers,  22  acres; 
Dutoitspan,  45  acres;  and  Bultfontein,  36  acres.  These  meas- 
urements more  than  cover  the  extent  of  the  original  locations, 

O  ' 

which  were  as  follows  :  Kimberley,  470  claims,  equal  to  10.37 
acres;  De  Beers,  622  claims,  equal  to  13.72  acres;  Dutoitspan, 
1441  claims,  equal  to  31.79  acres;  and  Bultfontein  1067  claims, 
equal  to  23.54  acres.  Only  a  few  scattered  diamonds  were 
found  outside  of  the  rim  of  "reef"  enclosing  the  diamond- 
bearing:  craters. 

D 

To  present  clearly  the  progress  of  mining  in  the  several 
funnels,  it  is  desirable  to  trace  the  advance  of  each  separately 


OPENING   THE    CRATERS 


221 


through  the  period  of  the  open  mine  working,  to  show  the  dif- 
ferent methods  employed,  and  how  one  mine  profited  by  the 
costly  experience  of  another.  The  superior  richness  of  the 
diamond-bearing  ground  in  Kimberley  mine  urged  forward  its 
opening  more  rapidly  than  the  development  of  the  others, 
and  this  may  properly  be  outlined  first.  The  plan  of  min- 
ing, with  the  reservation  of  roadways  determined  by  the  Free 
State  inspectors,  proved  a  poor  makeshift  at  best,  before  the 
sinking  of  claims  had  progressed  many  feet  below  the  sur- 


The  Breaking-up  of  the  Roads,  Kimberley  Mine,  1872. 

face.  The  bordering-claim  owners  undercut  the  roadways  cross- 
ing the  mine,  in  working  to  the  bounds  of  their  allotments, 
and  these  reserved  roads  soon  began  to  cave  away  in  places  to 
an  extent  that  made  the  passage  of  carts  very  risky.  It  was 
doubtless  convenient  to  have  ready  access  to  every  part  of  the 
surface  of  the  mine,  and  it  was  a  moving  spectacle  when  four- 
teen parallel  roadways  were  covered  with  files  of  plunging  mules 
and  rumbling  carts,  goaded  by  the  cries  and  whips  of  many  hun- 
dreds of  half-naked  Kafirs  or  white  drivers ;  but  it  was  a  piti- 
ful burlesque  of  mining  when  the  roadways  cracked  and  crumbled, 
and  crevasses  were  bridged  with  sliding  planks,  and  mule  carts 


222      THE    DIAiMOND    MINES    OF-  SOUTH    AFRICA 


Miners  going  to  Work. 


and  men  staggered  and  slipped  over  the  roadsides  into  abysses. 
Yet  in  spite  of  all  risks  and  accidents,  the  roads  were  patched 
up  and  maintained  in  some  shape  long  after  it  was  evident  that 
they  were  doomed.  At  length  no  possible  patching  and  bridg- 


OPENING    THE    CRATERS 


223 


The  Hand  Drums  used  for  Winding-up  the  Blue  Ground. 

ing  could  arrest  their  fall.     One  after  another,  before  the  end 

of  the  year  1 872,  had  crumbled  away  and  slipped  into  the  great  pit. 

The  mine  was  then  an  open,  oval  quarry,  about  a  thousand 


De  Beers  Mine,  1874. 

feet   in   length   and   six   hundred   feet  in   extreme  width.     The 
broken  blue  ground  on  the  face  of  the  rough  jumble  of  terraces 


224      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

had  been  hoisted  to  the  surface  usually  in  buckets,  by  means  of 
a  rope  passing  around  a  windlass  and  through  a  pulley  fixed 
in  a  pole  set  near  the  edge  of  the  claim,  but  in  1872  a  simple 
device  of  haulage  over  two  grooved  wheels  was  largely  intro- 
duced. One  wheel  was  set  on  the  pit  bottom,  and  the  other  on 
the  surface,  with  a  handle  attached  by  means  of  which  one  or 
more  stout  natives  could  wind  up  a  rope  passing  from  wheel 
to  wheel,  carrying  up  a  loaded  bucket  and  lowering  an  empty 


Kimberley  Mine,  1873. 

one.  This  crude  device  served  the  purpose  as  long  as  a  wheel 
could  be  set  near  the  edge  of  a  claim  on  unbroken  ground,  or 
along  the  roadway ;  but  when  all  the  claims  were  at  the  bottom 
of  one  huge  open  pit,  it  was  obvious  that  only  the  outer  tier  of 
claims  could  be  worked  by  this  method. 

Then  a  haulage  system  of  really  remarkable  ingenuity  was 
contrived.  A  massive  timber  staging  was  set  completely  around 
the  mouth  of  the  mine,  carrying  two,  and  in  parts  three,  plat- 
forms, one  above  the  other.  The  upper  platform  was  connected 
by  strongly  anchored  ropes  with  the  claims  in  the  middle  of  the 
mine,  and  the  lower  platform  in  the  same  way,  with  the  claims 


OPENING   THE    CRATERS 


225 


Kimberley  Mine,  1874. 


nearer  the  margin  of  the  mines.  Where  there  was  a  third  inter- 
vening platform,  ropes  were  stretched  to  claims  lying  between 
the  outer  and  inner  circle.  Windlasses  were  set  on  the  plat- 


Another  View  of  Kimberley  Mine,  1875. 


*•**.  £>-• 
OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY 


226       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


Natives  carrying  Ground  out  of  Dutoitspan  Mine  in  Buckets.     Mine  flooded,  May,  1874. 

forms,  together  with  guide  wheels  over  which  hauling  ropes 
passed,  dragging  the  buckets  swiftly  from  the  bottom  of  the 
mine  on  little  overhead  runners,  rattling  over  the  stationary 
roped  inclines.  When  the  loaded  buckets  reached  the  platform 
levels  they  were  dumped  into  chutes  carrying  the  contents  into 
bags,  which  were  readily  carted  away  to  level  depositing  grounds, 
or  "floors,"  as  they  were  technically  termed,  where  the  blue 
ground  was  sifted  and  sorted.  The  empty  buckets  were  easily 


Back  View  of  the  Staging  with  Grooved  Wheels,  at  Kimberley,  1874. 


OPENING   THE    CRATERS 


227 


returned,  running  back  by  force  of  gravity  over  the  ropes  to 
the  claims.  The  buckets  were  of  rawhide,  for  this  material 
was  found  to  be  more  lasting  than  iron,  and  the  ropes  were  at 
first  largely  of  hemp  or  twisted  rawhide ;  but  iron  and  steel 
wire  gradually  replaced  all  other  material. 

So  thickly  together  were  these  lines  set,  that  the  whole  face 
of  the  vast  pit  seemed  to  be  covered  by  a  monstrous  cobweb, 
shining  in  the  moonlight  as  if  every  filament  was  a  silver  strand. 
Never  has  any  eye  seen  such  a  marvellous  show  of  mining  as 


Kimberley  Mine,  1875. 

was  given  in  this  grand  amphitheatre,  when  the  huge  pit  was  sunk 
far  below  the  surface  level ;  when  the  encircling  wreath  of  the 
chasm  rose  sheer  and  black  like  the  walls  of  a  deep,  gloomy 
canyon,  or  the  swelling  round  of  a  demon's  caldron ;  when  a 
downward  glance  from  the  perch  of  a  platform  made  weak  heads 
reel ;  when  thousands  of  half-naked  men,  dwarfed  to  pygmy 
size,  were  scratching  the  face  of  the  pit  with  their  puny  picks 
like  burrowing  gnomes  ;  when  thousands  more,  all  grimy  and 
sweating  and  odorous,  were  swarming  around  the  pit's  mouth, 
dragging  up  loads  of  diamond-sprinkled  ground  and  carrying 
off  their  precious  sacks ;  when  hide  buckets  were  flying  like 


228       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


Snow  in  Kimberley  Mine,  June  21,  1876. 


shuttles  in  a  loom  up  and  down  the  vast  warp  of  wires,  twanging 
like  dissonant  harp-strings,  with  a  deafening  din  of  rattling 
wheels  and  falling  ground ;  and  where  every  beholder  was  won- 
der-struck at  the  thought  that  this  weird  creation  in  the  heart  of 


Method  of  Hauling,  De  Beers  Mine,  1873. 


OPENING   THE    CRATERS 


229 


South  Africa  had  been  evolved  by  men  for  the  sake  of  a  few 
buckets  of  tiny  white  crystals  to  adorn  the  heads  and  hands  of 
fanciful  women.1 


The  First  Horse  Whim,  Kimberley  Mine,  1874. 

With  the  deepening  of  the  mine,  "  horse  whims,"  first  intro- 
duced in  1874,  were  gradually  substituted  for  hand  tackle  in 
hoisting  and  lowering  the  buckets,  which  were  enlarged  tubs 


Hauling  Gear  and  Jumpers,  Kimberley  Mine,  1878. 

1  When  Lord  Randolph  Churchill  visited  the  diamond  fields,  while  looking  at  a 
huge  parcel  of  diamonds  he  remarked,  "  All  for  the  vanity  of  woman."  A  lady, 
who  heard  the  remark,  added,  "  and  the  depravity  of  man." 


230       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


A  Nook  in  Kin 


.-,  1874. 


holding  five  or  six  cubic  feet  of  blue  ground.  These  whims 
were  timber  wheels  from  fourteen  to  eighteen  feet  in  diameter, 
set  near  the  edge  of  the  mine,  to  revolve  horizontally  about 


A  SECTION  OF  DE  BEERS  MINE,  1874,  SHOWING  SHALE  AS  THE  WALL  ROCK. 


OPENING   THE    CRATERS 


231 


eight  feet  above  the  surface  level.     To  turn  the  whim  an  iron 

D 

hoop,  projecting  from  the  wheel,  was  attached  to  the  harness  of 
a  horse  or  mule.  The  hauling  rope  was  wound  above  the  hol- 
lowed rim  of  the  wheel,  and  each  end  of  the  rope  was  fastened 
to  a  tub,  one  hauling  up  the  load  of  blue  ground,  and  the  other 
lowering  the  empty  tub. 

In  the  following  year,  1875,  the  first  steam  winding  engine 
employed  at  the  mines  was  transported  to  Kimberley  to  take 
the  place  of  horse  power  in  moving  the  whim,  and  the  first 


The  Horse  Whims,  Kimberley  Mine,  1875. 

application  of  modern  mining  methods  to  the  South  African  Dia- 
mond Fields  was  made.  This  seemingly  tardy  development  was 
due  less  to  a  lack  of  enterprise  than  to  the  heavy  charges  of 
freight  transportation  from  the  coast,  ranging  for  years  over 
£30  per  ton,  and  to  the  scarcity  and  cost  of  fuel,  combined  with 
the  lack  of  any  positive  assurance  of  the  continuance  in  depth 
of  the  diamond-bearing  ground.  Such  a  deposit  of  diamonds 
as  had  been  uncovered  in  the  South  African  farm  lands  had 
never  been  opened  before,  and  the  erection  of  costly  machinery 
for  its  extraction  was  naturally  deemed  an  unwarranted  risk. 


232       THE    DIAMOND    MINES   OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


Hauling  Gear,  Dutoitspan  Mine,  1876. 

But  as  the  cutting  passed  farther  and  farther  down  through 
the  reef-circled  funnels  without  disclosing  any  barren  stratum  or 
break  in  the  body  of  breccia,  the  surmise  rose  gradually  to  the 
point  of  conviction  that  the  funnels  were  craters  of  extinct  vol- 
canoes, filled  by  successive  eruptions  of  steam  or  gas  under  great 
pressure  with  a  diamantiferous  breccia,  carrying  fragments  of  vol- 
canic and  sedimentary  rocks  and  crystals  of  many  kinds  of  min- 
erals. This  conclusion,  however,  was  hardly  more  than  one  of 
several  varying  assumptions  in  advance  of  the  thorough  re- 
searches and  analyses  of  later  years,  when  the  prosecution  of 
deep  mining  works  determined  positively  the  existence  of  craters, 
the  character  of  the  breccia,  and  the  composition  of  its  encasing 
reef.  So  the  progress  of  mining  on  the  Diamond  Fields  was 
long  a  hesitating  and  tentative  advance,  groping  step  by  step 
into  the  depths  of  the  blue  ground. 

After  the  device  of  staging  and  hoisting  ropes  had  solved, 
for  a  time,  the  problem  of  open  excavation  in  the  Kimberley 
mine  crater,  and  the  caving  of  the  blue  ground  was  no  longer 
a  terror  to  the  diggers,  the  collection  of  water  in  the  pits  was  a 
serious  annoyance.  Most  of  this  water  was  surface  drainage, 


OPENING    THE    CRATERS 


233 


Surface  Loading  Boxes. 


Aerial  Trams  and  Surface  Chutes,  De  Beers  Mine,  1885. 


234       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

flooding  the  lower  levels  in  the  rainy  season,  but  never  sufficient 
in  quantity  to  have  been  any  considerable  obstacle,  if  the  mine 
had  been  equipped  with  the  ordinary  pumping  machinery  erected 
in  other  mining  districts.  The  lack  of  any  such  machinery, 
compelling  for  years  the  bailing  and  hoisting  of  the  water  in 
buckets  or  tubs  by  hand  or  horse  power,  was  no  slight  draw- 
back to  the  progress  of  sinking.  Hard  upon  this  impediment 
came  the  much  graver  trouble  occasioned  by  the  crumbling, 
cracking,  sliding,  and  falling  of  the  encasing  reef  of  decom- 
posed basalt  and  shale.  The  unstable  walls  of  these  soft  rocks 
caved  rapidly  upon  exposure  to  air  and  moisture  into  the  open 
pit,  and  the  fracturing  and  slipping  were  aggravated  by  the 
imprudent  vertical  cutting  of  the  mine,  removing  the  entire 
body  of  blue  ground  without  cutting  away  the  reef  in  compara- 
tively stable  terraces  or  slopes.  Obviously  no  single  claim-holder 
would  undertake  the  cost  of  removing  the  dangerous  reef  for 
the  common  benefit,  and  it  was  difficult  to  secure  the  general 
cooperation  and  subscriptions  so  urgently  required  for  this  work. 
What  is  everybody's  business  in  theory  has  too  often  been 
nobody's  business  in  practice.  The  mean  and  short-sighted 


Hauling  Gear,  Kimberley  Mine,  1885. 


OPENING   THE    CRATERS 


235 


hope  to  be  protected  without  cost  by  the  enterprise  of  the  more 
liberal  and  prudent !  The  central  claim  holders  counted  on  the 
distance  of  their  claims  from  the  reef  to  assure  their  safety,  and 
the  outer  circles  of  claim-holders  hung  upon  luck  to  shield  their 
ground.  But  the  frequent  recurrence  of  reef  falls  and  slides, 


The  French  Company's  Sling  Gear,  1885. 

together  with  the  gathering  of  troublesome  water  pools,  so 
emphasized  the  necessity  of  combination  that  a  Mining  Board 
was  organized  in  1874  by  general  concurrence  of  the  claim- 
holders,  with  power  to  levy  a  comprehensive  assessment  to  cover 
the  expense  of  keeping  the  mine  clear  of  water  and  fallen  reef. 
This  board  took  the  place  of  the  original  "  Diggers'  Committee  " 
which  had  hitherto  been  charged  with  the  execution  of  the  crude 
code  of  mining  regulations. 

The  creation  of  this  new  administrative  board  was  a  move 
in  the  right  direction,  but  unfortunately  it  did  not  go  far 
enough.  The  opening  of  so  large  a  number  of  small  separate 
claims  by  individual  holders  barred  the  essential  application  of 
system  to  the  sinking  of  the  great  pit.  The  Mining  Board 
lacked  the  means,  if  it  had  the  foresight,  to  undertake  the 


236      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF    SOUTH    AFRICA 


checking  of  the  reef  slides  by  cutting  back  the  vertical  reef 
walls,  and  it  attempted  little  practically  besides  the  removal  of 
the  drainage  and  spring  water  and  the  clearing  away  of  fallen 
reef  from  the  face  of  the  blue  ground.  This  was  slipshod 
mining  at  best,  for  the  bare  extraction  of  the  reef,  which  had 
slid  and  fallen  over  the  claims,  actually  exposed  the  mine  to 
further  reef  slides,  and  this  disaster  was  aggravated  by  the  utter 

lack  of  system  in 
clearing  off  the 
fallen  debris. 
Every  claim- 
holder  was  per- 
mitted to  clear 
off  his  own  claim 
independently, 
and  credited  with 
an  allowance  of 
4^.  for  every  load 
of  1  6  cubic  feet 
of  broken  reef 
removed.  The 
clearing  of  the 
face  of  one  claim 
or  a  cluster  of 
claims  was  no 

Loading  Tubs  at  Bottom  of  Kimberley  Mine,  1885.  SCCUHtV 


repeated    reef  slides,  and   barred   the  possibility  of  developing 
any  section  of  a  mine  in  an  economical  and  well-planned  way. 

The  practical  impossibility  of  opening  a  little  claim,  whose 
surface  area  was  only  961  square  feet,  beyond  a  limited  depth 
forced  the  consolidation  of  claims  in  spite  of  the  original  pro- 
hibition of  "claim  blocking."  The  poorer  sections  of  ground 
were  the  first  to  feel  the  pressure  for  the  enlargement  of  hold- 
ings, and,  to  secure  the  continuance  of  working,  permission  was 
granted  in  1874  by  the  Kimberley  Mining  Board  for  the  hold- 
ing of  ten  claims  by  a  single  owner.  This  concession  led  to 


OPENING   THE    CRATERS 


237 


further  combination  and  consolidation  of  claims  in  the  hands 
of  partners  and  stock  companies,  but  the  comprehensive  union 
essential  to  the  proper  development  of  the  mine  was  far  too  long 
delayed.  The  mining  operations  of  a  number  of  individual 
claim-owners,  firms,  and  companies  —  whether  in  keen  rivalry 
or  in  varying  degrees  of  energy  and  listlessness  without  any  sus- 


The  Standard  Company's  Claim,  Bottom  of  Kimberley  Mine,  1885. 

tained  concert  of  views  and  means  —  could  not  be  prosecuted 
efficiently  and  prudently  within  the  small  area  of  a  diamond- 
mine  crater.  Unluckily  for  the  advance  of  diamond  mining 
and  the  fortune  of  many  struggling  claim-holders,  this  irresist- 
ible conclusion  was  not  made  clear  to  the  mass  of  miners  until 
it  was  demonstrated  after  long  years  of  costly  fumbling  in  the 
diamond-bearing  funnels. 

In  view  of  the  subdivision  of  ownership,  the  incoherence  of 
the  mining  operations,  and  the  lack  of  essential  funds,  the 
Mining  Board  can  hardly  be  charged  with  a  great  part  of  the 


238      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OE   SOUTH    AFRICA 


Bottom  of  Dutoitspan  Mine  Open  Workings. 

burden  of  responsibility  for  the  failure  to  save  the  mine  from 
disaster  through  reef  falls.  The  open  pit  working  was  not  its 
design,  but  the  inexperienced  undertaking  of  a  mass  of  diggers 
who  could  not  be  prevented  from  extracting  the  diamond-bear- 
ing ground  in  their  own  rude  way.  They  scooped  out  the 
crater  to  a  depth  that  made  reef  falls  inevitable,  and  pushed  on 
their  cuts  through  the  body  of  blue  ground,  in  spite  of  all  warn- 
ing falls  and  slides,  long  after  it  was  apparent  to  any  mining 
engineer  that  the  open  pit  sinking  could  not  be  continued  with 
safety  to  the  workers  or  with  profit  to  the  owners. 

But  it  is  impossible  to  approve  the  relief  measures  of  the 
Mining  Board.  It  could  only  check  the  reef  falls  at  best,  tem- 
porarily and  partially,  but  it  failed  to  do  even  this.  It  set  up 
expensive  hoisting  machinery  on  the  surface  level  at  opposite 
ends  of  the  mine,  and  sunk  a  large  vertical  shaft  (Kendric  shaft) 
in  the  reef  at  a  point  two  hundred  yards  from  the  northeast  edge 
of  the  crater,  with  the  apparent  intention  of  removing  reef  rock 
through  this  opening  or  determining  the  continuance  of  the  blue 


OPENING   THE    CRATERS 


239 


ground  by  a  drift  to  the  crater  below  the  pit  bottom.  The  shaft 
was  driven  down  to  the  depth  of  286  feet,  when  a  stratum  of  vol- 
canic rock  was  reached,  so  hard  that  the  work  was  abandoned. 
No  use  whatever  was  made  of  this  costly  shaft,  and  no  consid- 
erable attempt  was  made  to  cut  back  the  dangerous  reef  wall. 
Even  with  the  stinted  means  at  the  command  of  the  Board, 
something  might  have  been  done  to  preserve  the  mine,  and  an 
energetic  and  well-directed  push  to  this  end  would  have  com- 
manded at  least  the  confidence  and  support  of  the  more  in- 
telligent claim-holders.  So,  when  the  caving  of  the  reef  cast 
enormous  heaps  of  debris  upon  the  claims  in  the  pit,  the  lack  of 
foresight  of  the  Mining  Board  was  discreditably  apparent.  The 
cost  of  removing  the  reef  rock  was  then  vastly  increased,  and 
the  burden  was  the  heavier  because  the  reef  falls  prevented  the 
extraction  of  the  buried  blue  ground. 

Two  of  the  larger  companies,  the  French  and  the  Central, 
holding  claims  in  the  mine,  were  the  first  to  undertake  the  re- 
moval of  the  solid  reef  on  any  extensive  scale,  by  sinking  shafts, 
in  1878-1879,  at  points  several  hundred  feet  distant  from  the 


Pumping  Engine  in  Kimberley  Mine,  1875. 


24o      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF    SOUTH    AFRICA 

north  and  south  sides  of  the  mine.  By  this  means  considerable 
reef  was  removed,  and  a  third  shaft  was  sunk  in  1882  through 
the  northeast  reef  border  to  check  the  imminent  peril  at  that 
edge  of  the  mine.  To  supplement  the  service  of  these  shafts 
inclined  tramways  were  opened  on  the  west  and  east  sides  of 
the  mine  to  cut  back  the  upper  reef  walls,  while  wire  tramways 
were  stretched  from  the  bottom  of  the  mine  to  the  surface  edge 
to  carry  off  the  fallen  reef  in  large  tipping  tubs,  holding  from 
1 6  to  32  cubic  feet  of  broken  rock.  At  the  end  of  1881  tram- 
ways, aggregating  19  miles  in  length,  had  been  constructed  by 


Incline  Tramway  for  Hauling  Reef,  1878. 

the  claim-holders  and  the  Mining  Board.  Steam  pumping 
engines  had  been  put  in  to  pump  out  the  influx  of  water,  and 
this  obstacle  was,  at  last,  easily  overcome.  To  hasten  and 
cheapen  the  extraction  of  blue  ground,  drilling  and  blasting  were 
substituted  for  hand  labor  with  picks,  and  the  work  of  mining 
was  pressed  with  incessant  energy.  But  the  sliding,  falling  reef 
mocked  every  effort  to  withstand  it. 

The  work  of  removal  was  undertaken  too  late.  The  reef 
slipped  faster  than  the  tram  cars  and  tubs  could  haul  it  out. 
In  1878  more  than  a  quarter  of  the  surface  of  the  claims  in 
the  mine  was  covered  by  fallen  reef.  The  cost  of  removal, 
at  the  original  allowance  rate  of  4^.  per  load  of  16  cubic  feet. 


DIAMOND    MINKS    Of     >OUTH    AFRICA 

south  side;-,  of  the  n\-->         By  this  means  considerable 

•A.J^  removed,  and  a  '  <i.ift  was  sunk  in   1882  through 

••theast   reef"  I  :  uc  k   the   imminent  peril  at  that 

•>r   rfv  mine.  ppinnent  the  service  of  these  shafts 

hned   n  iinwuvs  \*v       opened  on   the  west  and  east  sides  of 

•  mine  .    upper  reef  walls,  while  wire  tramways 

!  from  r'K  bottom  of   the  mine  to  the  surface  edge 

:o   carr  M    reel    in    i.trge   tipping  tubs,  holding  from 

broken  imk.      At  the  end  of  1881  tram- 
wax  -  miles   in   len^li,  had   been  constructed  by 


WATER   IN   KIMBERLEY   MINE,   MAY,    1874. 


and    the     Mining    Board.      Steam    pumping 

put  in  to  pump  out  the  influx  of  water,  and 

,  ar    last,  easiK     o\erconu.       To    hasten    and 

ctiun  offline  ground,  drilling  and  blasting  were 

nd   labor  with  picks  and  the  work  of  mining 

MKessanr  energy.      But  the  sliding,  falling  reef 

-r-f  to  withstand  it. 

emoval  was  undertaken   too   late.      The  reef 

'he    (ram    cars   and   tubs  could  haul  it  out. 

an   :i  cjiiarter  of  the   surface  of  the    claims  in 

by   fallen    reef.      The    cost    of  removal, 

loua'i.e    .i.~e   of  4.1-.   per   load   of  16   cubic  feet," 


OPENING   THE    CRATERS 


241 


mounted  so  high  that  the  Mining  Board  was  constrained  to  cut 
down  the  allowance  to  is.  6d.,  but  even  with  the  rate  reduced 
the  expenditure  for  reef  work  and  drainage  in  1879  anc^  1880 
ran  over  ^15 0,000  a  year,  and  in  1881  it  rose  to  over  ^200,000. 
Still,  the  need  of  stimulating  extraordinary  exertion  was  then  so 
apparent  that  the  rate  was  put  up  to  3^.  9^.  a  load  in  October, 
1 88 1,  and  for  the  eighteen  months  following  fifty-six  million 
cubic  feet  of  broken  reef  were  hauled  away  by  the  claim-holders 


Hauling  Reef,  Kimberley  Mine,  1875. 

alone,  at  a  cost  to  the  Board  of  over  ^£6  50,000,  without  reckon- 
ing the  amount  extracted  by  the  operation  of  its  own  tramways. 
This  stupendous  charge  was  obviously  too  heavy  to  be 
borne  even  by  the  richest  diamond  mine,  and  no  assessment 
scheme  could  sustain  it.  The  Board  struggled  for  months 
under  the  load,  issuing  notes  when  it  had  no  cash  in  hand ;  but 
in  March,  1883,  its  issue  of  outstanding  notes  or  "  reef-bills  "  was 
so  great  that  its  book  showed  a  debit  balance  of  over  ^£2  50,000, 
and  the  local  banks  would  extend  no  further  credit.  The  Board 
was  bankrupt,  reef  extraction  was  stopped,  perforce,  and  the 


242      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF    SOUTH    AFRICA 


claim-holders  were  face  to  face  with  an  appalling  situation  ;  for 
in  spite  of  all  efforts  and  the  outflow  of  money  like  a  water- 
spout, the  resistless  reef  was  unchecked.  The  mine  walls  con- 
tinued to  fall  in  faster  than  they  could  be  hauled  out,  and  even 
central  claims  in  the  mine  were  buried.  The  gloomiest  forebod- 
ings fell  like  a  black  cloud  on  the  spirits  of  claim-holders.  In 

the  judgment  of 
many  observers,  the 
great  Kimberley  dia- 
mond mine  was 
doomed  beyond  hope 
of  resurrection. 

The  open  pit  had 
been  sunk  to  the 
depth  of  something 
over  four  hundred 
feet,  in  the  lowest 
working,  at  the  end 
of  the  year  1882.  In 
order  to  haul  out  one 
million  loads  of  blue 
ground  during  that 
year,  three  million 
loads  of  reef  had 
been  raised.  The 
cost  of  hauling  was 
increasing  with  the 
deepening  of  the 
mine,  and  owing  to  the  reef  falls,  the  production  of  diamonds 
was  disastrously  sinking.  In  1883  the  lack  of  funds  only  per- 
mitted the  lifting  of  one  and  a  half  million  loads  of  reef  at  a  cost 
of  ^£250,000,  and  the  output  of  blue  ground  sunk  to  350,000 
loads.  In  November  of  that  year  a  long  portended  reef  slide 
cast  250,000  cubic  yards  of  shale  upon  the  face  of  the  pit,  piling 
its  mass  on  the  claims  half  across  the  mine.  This  was  seemingly 
a  crushing  infliction.  It  was,  at  least,  a  conclusive  proof  that 


Reef  Falls,  Kimberley  Mine,  1881. 


OPENING   THE    CRATERS 


243 


244      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

open  pit  sinking  was  no  longer  feasible  even  for  the  richest 
claim-holders.  About  four  million  cubic  yards  of  reef  had  been 
hauled  at  a  cost  of  nearly  ^£2,000,000,  yet  there  was  no  check 
to  the  reef  falls  and  slides.  At  the  close  of  the  year  the  Inspec- 
tor of  Mines  reported 
that  "  only  about  fifty 
claims  had  been  regularly 
worked  during  the  past 
year."  The  field  for  the 
operation  of  individual 
claim-holders  was  deci- 
sively closed.  The  only 
hope  for  the  mine  was  in 
the  prosecution  of  deep 
and  extensive  under- 
ground works  by  the 
combination  of  claims  in 
hands  able  to  conduct 
such  operations  success- 
fully. 

In  advance  of  such 
an  undertaking  the  yield 
of  the  mine  was  fortu- 
nately sustained  by  an 

The  Central  Company's  Shaft,  Kimberley  Mine,  1885.          eXDCTt     makeshift  .Mr 

Edward  Jones,  a  trained  mining  engineer,  had  been  one  of  the 
leading  contractors  fof  the  removal  of  reef,  and  had  given  close 
study  to  the  problem  of  the  continuance  of  the  extraction  of  blue 
ground.  Through  his  design  and  insistent  confidence,  in  spite  of 
all  doubts  and  sneers,  a  shaft  was  sunk  through  the  mass  of  fallen 
reef  at  the  bottom  of  the  deepest  part  of  the  mine  by  lowering  a 
square  timber  frame  and  shovelling  out  the  loose  rock  from  the 
inside  of  the  enclosure.  The  frame  was  constructed  in  sections  on 
the  plan  of  a  coffer  dam,  adding  section  to  section  from  the  top  until 
a  stout  timber  shaft  passed  entirely  through  the  broken  shale  and 
entered  the  underlying  blue  ground.  The  shaft  was  then  read- 


OPENING    THE    CRATERS 


245 


ily  extended,  and  drifts  from  this  opening  were  made  through 
the  blue  ground.  The  peculiar  service  of  this  device  was  its 
saving  of  hundreds  of  feet  of  costly  shaft  cutting  through  the 
solid  reef  to  reach  the  blue  ground  —  a  very  desirable  contribu- 
tion at  a  time  when  the  richest  claim-holders  were  sharply  pinched 
by  the  failing  mine  and  the  discouragement  of  capital.  The  cost 
of  all  development  work  was  defrayed  by  the  blue  ground 
extracted  in  opening  the  drifts  and  cross-cuts,  so  that  there  was 
no  further  delay  in  resuming  operations  in  the  mine.  The  first 
shaft  had  been  sunk  on  the  ground  owned  by  the  Central  Com- 
pany, and  it  was  soon  copied  by  a  number  of  similar  shafts  in 
other  parts  of  the  mine.  This  brought  about  a  most  welcome 


The  Bottom  of  Kimberley  Mine,  1885. 


revival  of  mining,  and  was  so  far  highly  beneficial  to  the  labor- 
ers, claim-owners,  and  townspeople  of  Kimberley,  though  it  was 
not  designed  for  permanent  service. 

While  the  blue  ground  was  being  removed  through  shafts 
sunk  in  the  bottom  of  the  open  mine,  it  was  apparent  to  all  that 


246       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF    SOUTH    AFRICA 

the  life  of  these  shafts  must  be  very  short.  Preparation  was 
therefore  made  for  future  work  by  sinking  shafts  outside  the 
margin  of  the  open  mine,  and  at  sufficient  distance  from  it  to 
insure  them  against  any  probable  caving  of  the  surface  ground 
in  their  vicinity.  Vertical  shafts  were  sunk  by  the  Central  and 
French  companies,  and  tunnels  driven  from  them.  The  plan 
of  Kimberley  mine,  1883,  shows  these  tunnels. 


flpkfsm  cnt  Vafuohcn 
WTKrtcb  tofatfst  afotitonmcnt/ 


Before  describing  the  subsequent  application  of  engineering 
science  to  underground  mining,  it  is  desirable  to  trace  the  prog- 
ress of  the  other  mines  on  the  fields  to  the  period  in  develop- 
ment reached  by  the  leader.  The  claim-owners  in  De  Beers 
mine  profited  greatly  by  the  object  lessons  given  in  the  opening 
of  the  great  pit  of  Kimberley.  For  the  first  twelve  years  after 
the  discovery  of  the  mines,  the  Kimberley  mine  ran  far  ahead  of 
the  others  from  the  superiority  of  its  yield  for  some  distance 
below  the  surface.  The  fatal  error  of  the  neglect  of  the  claim- 


K    DIAM 


MINK:    OK    SOUTH    AFRICA 


if  these  shaft-^  ir  very  short.  Preparation  was 

rrfore  made  for  fin  ->rk  hy  sinking  shafts  outside  the 

.;rpn  of  the  open  ;  ,  iud  at  sufficient  distance  from  it  to 
i;r(.  ;he:n  ai^.iin- ?  *n\-  probable  caving  of  the  surface  ground 
thei  icinitv  tiii-;ai  shafts  were  sunk  hy  the  Central  and 

reach  cuinpanu-.  unu  tunnels  driven  from  them.  The  plan 
K;niber!r\  'Mine,  i«S8},  shows  these  tunnels. 


ra 


&  ^r 


KIMBERLEY    MINE,    1886, 
Showing  Shafts  at  the  Bottom  of  the  Open  Mine 


so 


v^S  i 


by   t 
r"eatly 
of  K 


the  subsequent  application  of  engineering 
d  mining,  ir  is  *i  Arable  to  trace  the  prog- 
es  on  the  fields  to  the  period  in  develop- 

v  leader.  The  claim-owners  in  De  Beers 
by  the  object,  lessons  gi\ren  in  the  opening 

imherlov.      For  the  first  twelve  years  after 

ines,  the  Kimberlev  mine  ran  far  ahead  of 

-upu-i'>ntv  of  its   yield   for  some  distance 

r.ror  of  rhe  r.cLjlfcr  of  the  claim- 


OF  THE 

NIVERSITY 

C  F 


OPENING   THE   CRATERS 


247 


Reef  Slips,  Kimberley  Mine,  1874. 


Kimberley  Mine,  showing  how  the  Ground  cracked  before  Subsidence. 


248      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


owners  and  Mining  Board  to  cut  back  the  mine  walls  was  appar- 
ent in  time  to  save  many  thousands  of  pounds  to  De  Beers. 
This  mine  was  also  fortunate  in  the  comparative  hardness  and 
stability  of  the  basaltic  rock  stratum  overlying  the  shale  and 
forming  the  marginal  top  of  its  pit  walls.  By  cutting  back  the 
reef  in  terraces,  the  De  Beers  Mining  Board  saved  the  mine 
from  any  serious  rock  falls  for  a  con-  siderable  number  of 
years.  Only  two  hundred  and  fifteen  thousand  cubic  yards 
of  reef  were  removed  in  the  five  p/ST^  i  years  ending  with 
1882,  but  this  sufficed  to  /TpSPl  protect  the  mine  for 

the  time.     The  cost  of 

^76,000,    a 

pared  with 
^'    berley 


its  removal  was  only 
slight  burden  com- 
the  charges  at  Kirn- 
mine,  and  showing  a 


The  Central  Company's  Atkins  Shaft. 

cost  per  yard  or  per  load  of  reef  raised  much  less  than  the  Kim- 
berley  average.  This  was  a  signal  demonstration  of  the  advan- 
tage of  prudently  cutting  away  the  reef  before  it  fell  into  the  pit 
and  buried  prolific  claims  and  increased  the  hauling  charges. 

This  precaution,  however,  did  not  suffice  to  shield  the  mine 
from  disaster  when  the  pit  was  greatly  deepened  after  the  reef 
falls  at  Kimberley  had  diverted  mining  enterprise  to  De  Beers. 
Over  one  hundred  and  forty  thousand  cubic  yards  of  solid 
and  broken  reef  were  removed  in  1883  and  1884,  but  reef  slides 
were  fast  increasing,  and  it  was  judged  necessary  by  the  Min- 
ing Board  to  stop  any  further  outlay  for  reef  hauling  when  the 
mine  bottom  was  350  feet  below  the  surface.  The  diamond- 
bearing  ground  had  then  been  scooped  out  of  the  larger  part  of 


OPENING    THE   CRATERS 


249 


The  Last  of  Open  Working,  Kimberley  Mine,  1889.     400  feet  deep. 

the  funnel,  but  there  was  still  a  large  area  of  yellow  ground  at 
the  west  end  which  had  not  yet  been  extracted  because  it  con- 
tained so  few  diamonds  compared  with  the  other  parts  of  the 
mine.  The  falls  of  reef  had  covered  the  eastern  end  of  the 


250      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


mine,  and  early  in  1885  the  west  end  yellow  ground  caved  in, 
and  an  enormous  mass  of  nearly  five  million  cubic  feet  fell  in 
one  day  to  the  bottom  of  the  mine,  overlapping  the  fallen  reef 
and  burying  the  claims  still  open  for  work.  This  disastrous  fall 
forced  the  stoppage  of  mining  for  six  months  until  some  part  of 
the  reef  and  yellow  ground  could  be  taken  out,  and  mining  was 
then  resumed  in  a  partial  and  half-hearted  way  in  the  open  pit, 
though  it  was  evident  that  further  pit  sinking  in  the  face  of  such 

disasters  was  irrational  mining. 

The  only  possible  resource 
was  the  introduction  of  a  system 
of  underground  mining,  and  the 
first  attempt  in  this  direction  was 
made  in  1884  by  the  opening  of 
a  large  circular  shaft  at  a  point 
1000  feet  from  the  north  margin 
of  the  mine.  This  shaft  was  sunk 
vertically  about  320  feet  in  the 
reef  and  then  abandoned  as  too 
costly.  In  its  place  an  incline 
was  sunk,  starting  from  a  point 
about  150  feet  from  the  west 
side  of  the  claims,  and  entering 
the  mine  at  the  edge  of  the  amyg- 
daloidal  trap  underlying  the  basalt 
and  shale,  so  as  to  avoid  the  expense  of  cutting  through  this 
hard  rock.  This  work  was  begun  none  too  soon,  for  before  the 
end  of  the  year  1887  further  open  pit  working  was  proved  to 
be  utterly  impracticable,  and  was  wholly  abandoned  when  the 
deepest  open  digging  had  been  carried  in  three  years  only  fifty 
feet  farther  than  the  depth  of  350  feet  reached  in  1884. 

Dutoitspan  mine  opening  was  practically  the  same  as  the 
course  followed  in  Kimberley  and  De  Beers.  Owing  to  the  com- 
parative poorness  of  the  diamond-bearing  ground,  pit  sinking 
was  not  pushed  as  rapidly  as  it  was  at  Kimberley,  and,  in  1874, 
most  of  the  miners  went  over  to  Kimberley  and  were  glad  of  the 


R.  D.  Atkins.     (Manager  of  Kimberley 
Mine  in  the  earlier  days.) 


OPENING   THE    CRATERS 


251 


No.  2  Incline  Shaft,  De  Beers  Mine. 

chance  of  working  over  the  "waste  ground"  which  had  been 
cast  away  from  the  cradles  and  sieves  of  the  early  diggers.  Two 
years  later,  when  improved  methods  of  handling  the  ground 
were  coming  into  use,  the  miners  flocked  back  to  the  abandoned 
ground  and  took  out  fresh  claims.  Warned  by  the  experience 
of  Kimberley,  a  circle  of  solid  blue  ground  was  left  as  a  buttress 
against  slides  and  falls  of  the  encasing  reef  of  shale,  and  for  ten 
years  this  expedient  served  to  shield  the  miners. 

But  this  safeguard  failed  when  the  open  working  had  reached 
a  few  hundred  feet  in  depth.     Warning  surface  cracks  had  been 


Eldorado  Road,  Dutoitspan  Mine,  1874. 


252      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

noticed  on  the  northern  margin  of  the  mine,  but  the  ardent 
diamond  seekers  kept  on  digging  recklessly,  until  one  day  in 
March,  1886,  when  a  huge  mass  of  blue  ground  and  reef  broke 
away  suddenly  from  the  northern  end  of  the  mine  and  rolled 
over  like  the  surge  of  a  monstrous  breaker,  falling  hundreds  of 
feet  with  a  fearful  crash  upon  the  doomed  men  at  the  bottom  of 


Claims  in  Dutoiispan  Mine. 

the  pit.  The  loss  of  life  would  have  been  frightful,  but  happily 
for  the  miners  the  fall  was  at  the  noon  dinner  hour,  when  the 
work  of  hoisting  blue  ground  was  stopped  and  blasting  in  the 
mine  was  begun.  Most  of  the  workmen  had  left  the  mine,  but 
eighteen  poor  fellows  —  eight  white  men  and  ten  Kafirs —  had 
taken  shelter  from  the  blasting  in  a  pumping  engine  house  in 
the  pit.  The  avalanche  of  rock  fell  on  the  house,  and  every  one 
in  it  was  fatally  crushed  or  scalded  by  the  escaping  steam.  One 
hundred  thousand  cubic  yards  of  shale  and  blue  ground  buried 
the  claims  on  the  pit  bottom,  and  this  fall  was  followed  by  others 
which  ruined  the  open  workings  in  1887,  when  tne  mme  nad 
reached  a  depth  of  400  feet. 

In  Bultfontein  there  was  only  another  variation  of  the  same 
tale  of  open  pit  working  and  final  wreck.  The  work  of  extract- 
ing the  yellow  and  blue  ground  was  well  planned  at  the  outset, 
under  existing  circumstances,  by  the  cutting  of  inclined  road- 
ways over  which  the  ground  was  hauled  in  bullock  carts.  In 


DIAMOND 


F    SOUTH    AFRICA 


-iorr:i. 


ot    the  mine,   but   the    ardent 

a^mg   recklessly,   until   one  day  in 

PI  ass  of  blue  ground  and  reef  broke 

irtliern    end   uf   the   mine  and  rolled 

"monstrous  breaker,  falling  hundreds  of 

pnn  the  doomed  men  at  the  bottom  of 


BULTFONTEIN    MINE,    1878. 


kin 


!irf.i!,  but  happily 

hour,  when  the 

vppe      and    blasting  in  the 

rLmen  had  left  the  mine,  but 

e   HI  en   anil   ten    Kafirs—  had 

a  pum]>intr  engine   house  in 

rhe  liouse,  and  every  one 

'he  t-M  aping  steam.     One 

ujt    and    i)!ue   ground   buried 

his  tail  \vas  followed  by  others 

;n    iSX-,  when  the  mine  had 


.•re  was  oijU'  Another  variation  of  the  same 

PL.  ar..i  ti.iai  wr  -ck.      The  work  of  extract- 

ue  groun(  :\\   planned   at  the  outset, 

stances,  bv    rhe   rurtinyj  of  inclined   road- 

'ro'ind  was   hauled   in    bullock   carts.      In 


OPENING   THE    CRATERS 


253 


1880  effective  hauling  machinery  was  substituted  for  the  carts, 
and  the  precious  ground  was  extracted  so  rapidly  that  the  depth 
of  about  five  hundred  feet  was  reached  in  the  open  working,  a 
point  probably  beyond  any  attained  in  the  other  pits.  Here, 
too,  as  at  De  Beers,  there  was  an  effort  to  protect  the  mine  by 
cutting  back  the  reef  in  terraces ;  but  this  safeguard  was  tried 
too  late,  and  in  any  event  it  could  only  have  deferred  for  a  few 
years  the  fate  of  the  mine.  Before  the  close  of  the  year  1889 
almost  the  whole  of  the  pit  bottom  was  covered  with  fallen  reef 
and  only  four  engines  were  at  work  hauling  blue  ground. 

The  Extraction  of  the  Diamonds 

While  the  sinking  of  the  pits  was  progressing  with  improved 
mining  appliances,  there  had  been  a  considerable  advance  in  the 
methods  of  concentrating  the  diamond-bearing  ground  and  win- 


Bultfontein  Mine,  1879. 


ning  the  diamonds.  For  the  first  three  years  after  the  opening 
of  the  mines,  the  handling  of  precious  ground  was  exceedingly 
crude  and  wasteful.  The  broken  ground  taken  from  the  craters 
was  crushed  more  or  less  finely  by  pounding  with  shovels  and 


254      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

mallets  and  clubs.  Then  it  was  sifted  in  rocking  troughs,  fitted 
with  sieves  like  the  placer  miners'  cradles,  and  the  concentrate  of 
pebbles  and  crystals  and  coarse  rock  grains  was  spread  on  tables, 
or  sheets  of  iron  and  wood  laid  on  the  ground,  where  it  was 
scraped  over  by  hand,  and  the  gems  picked  out.  In  this  rough 
process  a  third  and  perhaps  a  half  of  the  smaller  crystals  were  left 
in  the  waste  ground,  and  the  losses  from  theft  were  enormous. 

In  1874  there  was   a  change  for  the  better  in  the  introduc- 
tion of  water  in  concentrating.      By  building  dams  and  sinking 


The  First  Rotary  Washing  Machine. 

wells  the  water  supply  of  the  camp  was  increased  materially,  and 
it  was  possible  to  divert  a  portion  for  the  diamond-washing 
appliances.  Most  of  the  early  machines  for  this  purpose  were 
simple  cradles  with  riffles  or  ridges  set  at  intervals  on  the 
bottom,  and  a  sieve  at  the  end.  The  pulverized  ground  was 
dumped  into  a  cradle  with  a  sufficient  flow  of  water  to  carry  off 
the  slime,  while  the  rocking  shook  the  ground,  and  caused  a 
settling  of  the  heavier  mineral  deposit  at  the  bottom.  With  one 
of  these  rockers  from  six  to  thirteen  cartloads  of  ground  were 
washed  in  a  day.  Another  device  was  a  circular  trough  or  pan, 


OPENING   THE    CRATERS 


255 


fitted  with  a  revolving  set  of  iron  teeth  like  a  comb,  that  stirred 
the  ground  and  water  and  caused  the  settling  of  the  concentrate. 


Another  Early  Washing  Machine,  1874. 

This  puddling  trough  would  concentrate  from  twenty-five  to 
thirty-five  cartloads  in  a  working  day  and  cost  at  first,  about 
^£250,  while  the  simpler  cradle  could  be  bought  for  ^15,  or 
less.  There  were  other  more  elaborate  devices,  but  their  cost 
put  them  out  of  the  reach  of  the  ordinary  digger.  All  were 
based  on  one  adaptation  or  another  of  the  puddling  principle, 
and  the  fall  and  separation  of  minerals  of  different  specific 
gravities. 

The    sorting  of  the   concentrate   from    the 
puddling    troughs    was    done    by    the    same 
method    employed    after    the    dry    sifting, 
but  there  was  some  improvement  in  the 


Horse-power  Washing  Machine,  1875. 


256      THE   DIAMOND   MINES   OF   SOUTH   AFRICA 


OPENING   THE    CRATERS 


257 


258      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

precautions  against  loss  by  theft.  (The  natives,  who  were  com- 
monly employed  in  scraping  and  picking  over  the  mineral  de- 
posit, were  more  carefully  watched.  Some  were  lodged  in  tents 
and  sheds  adjoining  the  stables  belonging  to  claim-owners,  and 
there  was  some  oversight  of  them  by  night  as  well  as  by  day. 
When  the  claim-owners  combined  in  companies,  their  workmen 
were  frequently  kept  together  in  enclosures  called  "compounds," 
where  they  were  furnished  with  food  and  shelter  at  moderate 
charges  deducted  from  their  pay.  This  sepa- 
ration and  partial  restriction  was  of  undoubted 
service,  not  only  in  diminishing  the  oppor- 
tunities for  successful  theft  and  disposal 


Washing  Gear,  Bultfontein  Mine. 

of  stolen  diamonds,  but  in  checking  the  drunkenness  of  the  black 
workmen  and  the  outbreaks  in  the  canteens  and  streets. 

Progress  was  made,  too,  though  much  too  slowly,  in  the 
more  perfect  pulverization  of  the  blue  ground.  It  was  soon 
observed  that  the  broken  ground  would  crumble  upon  exposure 
to  the  air,  and  after  some  weeks  or  months,  according  to  its 
hardness,  a  mass  of  breccia,  thinly  spread  out  and  raked  over, 
would  be  very  largely  decomposed  to  fine  sand  fit  for  washing, 
without  further  treatment.  This  natural  pulverization  was  far 
cheaper  and  better  than  crushing  with  mallets  ;  but  the  burden 
of  accumulating  and  storing  great  quantities  of  ground  was  too 
heavy  for  the  ordinary  claim-holder,  who  was  dependent  upon 
quick  returns  :  so  only  the  larger  companies  maintained  stores 


OPENING   THE    CRATERS 


259 


of  ground  on  their  depositing  places  or  "  floors,"  and  none  of 
these,  even,  were  disposed  to  wait  for  the  adequate  pulverization 
of  the  ground  by  the  natural  agencies  of  the  sun,  air,  and  rain. 
Still  the  floors  were  gradually  enlarged  on  the  veld,  and  were 
frequently  fenced  in  with  wire.  Year  by  year  an  increasing 
proportion  of  blue  ground  was  pulverized.  The  average  yield 
of  a  truck  load,  or  sixteen  cubic  feet  of  blue  ground,  from  Kim- 


steam  Washing  Gear,  Kimberley  Mine. 

berley  mine,  was  computed  to  be  one  carat  in  diamonds,  a  valu- 
ation ranging  from  twenty-eight  to  thirty-six  shillings,  according 
to  prevailing  market  rates. 

The  mining  camps  changed,  year  by  year,  more  completely 
to  the  appearance  of  thriving  mining  towns.  De  Beers  fused 
with  De  Beers  New  Rush  in  the  town  of  Kimberley,  while 
the  town  of  Dutoitspan  rose  on  its  camp  site  two  miles  away. 
The  connecting  roadway  was  lined  with  straggling  houses. 
There  was  little  available  timber  fit  for  building  purposes,  but 
galvanized  iron  was  very  largely  substituted  for  the  canvas  tents 
during  the  first  ten  years,  and,  from  1880  on,  many  brick  build- 
ings were  erected  at  Kimberley.  Outside  of  the  main  business 
street  there  was  little  attempt  at  first, to  lay  out  regular  avenues, 


26o      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF    SOUTH    AFRICA 


and  the  diggers  shifted  their  tents  or  "  tin  houses "  to  any 
vacant  place  that  suited  their  fancy.  The  little  galvanized  iron 
buildings  were  so  light  and  strongly  riveted  that  they  could  be 
picked  up  and  carried  away  by  a  few  strong  Kafirs.  But  with 


Webb's  Washing  Machine,  1878. 

the  growth  of  the  towns  stands  became  more  valuable,  and  title 
and  possession  were  more  sharply  looked  after.  In  1876  the 
valuation  of  the  town  of  Kimberley  for  assessment  or  taxation 
purposes  was  $5,151,500.  Churches,  schools,  banks,  hotels, 
theatres,  concert  rooms,  and  stores  and  offices  of  various  kinds 
were  erected  to  answer  the  demands  of  a  prospering  mining  town. 
Sidewalks  were  laid  along  the  principal  streets,  and  after  1874 
there  was  a  regular  appropriation  for  street  watering.  The 
houses  grew  in  size  and  stability.  Verandas  and  porticoes  were 
added  in  place  of  the  roof  projections  that  gave  a  little  shade  to 
the  early  diggers,  and  many  of  the  dwellings  were  set  with  a 
fringe  of  garden  in  front  or  on  the  sides,  in  which  fruit  trees  and 
vines  and  choice  flowers  were  planted. 

With  the  advance  of  the  diggings  in  depth,  the  combination 


OPENING   THE    CRATERS  261 

of  claims,  and  the  ending  of  widespread  prospecting,  the  influx  of 
whites  to  the  camps  fell  off  greatly.  The  shifting  population 
of  prospectors  dropped  to  the  number  that  could  find  employ- 
ment in  the  mines  or  in  the  dependent  towns.  It  was  estimated 
in  1876  that  the  white  population  of  Kimberley  was  about  eight 
thousand,  and  the  native  from  twelve  to  fifteen  thousand.  In 
Dutoitspan  and  Bultfontein  there  were  perhaps  six  thousand 
more  of  whites  and  blacks. 

The  character  of  this  population  has  been  most  absurdly 
decried.  "  The  Diamond  Fields  of  South  Africa,"  writes  one 
flighty  reporter,  "  have  been  hot-beds  of  rowdyism.  The  liber- 
tines, forgers,  bird-catchers,  and  other  outcasts  of  Europe  have 
found  a  refuge  there  as  in  Alsatia  of  old.  The  Houndsditch  Tew 

o  •/ 

and  the  London  rough  reign  supreme."  Thousands  of  wit- 
nesses might  be  summoned,  if  necessary,  to  refute  this  nonsense. 
Libertines  and  forgers  drift  elsewhere  for  prey  than  to  hot,  dusty 


Cape  of  Good  Hope  Company's  Washing  Gear,  1878. 

mining  camps  in  the  midst  of  the  karroo ;  though  dainty  folk 
might  shrink  from  the  roughness  and  grime  of  the  diamond  dig- 
gings, and  weak  nerves  might  be  shaken  by  the  boisterous  exu- 
berance of  the  bustling  camp,  the  restless  crowd  tramping  the 
streets,  the  uproarious  canteens  and  music  halls,  and  the  capers 


262      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

of  motley  diggers  and  wild  Africans.  Liquor  drinking  ran  to 
excess,  as  it  always  does  in  a  prosperous  mining  camp,  and  the 
natives  especially  were  given  to  drunkenness  ;  but  the  wildest 
sprees  rarely  threatened  danger  to  life,  for  the  hot  spirits  were 
blown  off  in  yells,  chants,  and  dances.  Every  accurate  record 
shows  that  murder  and  robbery  and  the  more  flagrant  and  brutal 
crimes  were  notably  rare  compared  with  the  showing  of  the  early 
American  and  Australian  mining  camps  ;  and  when  the  turbu- 
lence of  the  rush  was  over,  and  the  bubbling  camps  simmered 
down  to  the  comparative  order  and  steadiness  of  the  working 


Washing  Gear,  Dutoitspan  Mine. 

mining  towns,  there  was  little  disturbance  from  any  outbreak 
of  ruffianism.  In  spite  of  all  demoralizing  influences,  the  con- 
servative and  civilizing  agencies  and  public  spirit  that  advance 
communities  and  exalt  good  citizenship  gained  in  force  year  by 
year  on  the  Diamond  Fields. 

Notable  progress  was  made  in  the  provisions  for  the  health 
and  security  of  the  towns.  The  most  crying  need,  from  the 
first,  had  been  pure  and  abundant  water.  The  average  rainfall 
of  the  mining  field  was  only  17.5  inches,  and  the  suffering  from 
the  lack  of  water  in  the  dry  season  was  scarcely  endurable. 
Much  was  done  to  improve  and  increase  the  supply  by  the  sink- 
ing of  wells  and  extension  of  natural  reservoirs  and  the  more 


OPENING   THE    CRATERS 


263 


general  introduction  of  filtering  appliances.  Dr.  Morton  noted 
in  1876  a  marked  advance  in  the  health  of  the  population  on 
the  Fields.  The  death  rate  at  Kimberley,  he  said,  was  exceed- 
ingly small.  The  most  sickly  months  of  the  year  were  August 
and  January,  marking  the  effect  of  the  extremes  of  cold  and 
heat.  Outside  of  the  ailments  incident  to  the  dust  and  exposure 
and  sudden  variations  of  temperature,  there  was  little  disease, 
and  he  particularly  observed  the  complete  immunity  of  the 
field  from  hydrophobia,  though  every  man,  woman,  and  child 
appeared  to  have  a  dog  at  their  heels. 


Washing  Gear,  Bultfontein  Mine,  1878. 

It  was  soon  perceived,  however,  that  a  more  certain  and 
sufficient  supply  of  water  must  be  obtained  to  meet  the  growing 
demands  of  the  towns  and  mines.  This  was  secured  through 
the  enterprise  of  the  men  associated  in  the  Kimberley  Water 
Works  Company,  by  the  construction  of  a  pumping  station  at 
Riverton  on  the  Vaal  River  and  the  laying  of  a  main  sixteen 
miles  in  length  to  a  reservoir  on  a  ridge  of  the  Bultfontein 
farm,  near  Kimberley.  The  water  from  the  river  was  raised  in 
three  stages  by  powerful  compound  condensing  engines,  and  car- 
ried to  the  large  reservoir  on  the  ridge,  five  hundred  feet  above 


264      THE    DIAMOND    MINES   OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

the  river  level.  From  this  reservoir  it  was  distributed  by  a  pipe 
and  hydrant  system  to  the  towns  and  the  mines.  Since  the 
construction  of  this  fine  plant,  the  towns  have  been  supplied  with 
filtered  water  at  a  cost  of  is.  per  100  gallons ;  and  mines  using 
great  quantities  have  a  concession  materially  lowering  this  rate. 
The  amount  of  water  sold  to  Kimberley  annually  has  run  as 
high  as  230,000,000  gallons  and  more  than  300,000,000  have 
been  supplied  to  the  mines.  The  cost  of  the  machinery  and  plant 
was  over  ^300,000.  Mr.  E.  A.  Cowper,  the  consulting  engi- 
neer of  the  Water  Works  Company,  designed  the  machinery,  and 
Mr.  George  Buchanan,  C.E.,  was  the  constructing  engineer  in 
the  erection  of  the  plant. 

The  maintenance  of  peace  and  order  on  the  Diamond  Fields 
was  helped  forward  materially  by  the  construction  of  "  com- 
pounds," providing  good  lodging  and  food  for  the  natives,  check- 
ing their  drunkenness,  promoting  steady  industry,  and  enforcing 
restrictions  essential  to  the  common  security.  The  police  force 
of  the  towns  was  from  the  start  so  small  that  the  tolera- 
tion of  this  condition  attests  the  comparative  rarity  of  brutal 
crimes  on  the  Fields.  Its  very  marked  improvement  with  the 
growth  of  the  town,  in  later  years,  was  rather  due  to  the  rising 
demand  for  advance  in  every  civic  and  social  condition  than  to 
any  increase  in  disorderly  conduct  or  the  commission  of  crimes. 

Diamond  stealing  and  illicit  diamond  buying  were,  beyond 
all  question,  the  worst  plague  of  the  camps  and  towns.  Outside 
of  this  line  of  operation  there  was  practically  no  opening  and  no 
temptation  for  the  professional  thief  and  receiver  of  stolen  goods; 
but  the  opportunities  were  unfortunately  too  apparent  and  easy 
for  filching  and  disposing  of  diamonds.  The  sharpest  oversight 
could  scarcely  prevent  nimble-fingered  workers  from  slyly  secret- 
ing tiny  crystals  in  picking  over  the  concentrates  on  the  sorting 
tables  or  in  handling  the  deposit  in  the  rockers  and  puddling  pans. 
While  the  natives  were  allowed  to  rove  about  freely  after  their 
day's  work  was  done,  they  had  little  difficulty  in  transferring  the 
diamonds  to  the  hands  of  the  sharpers,  who  were  always  in  wait 
for  the  chance  of  buying  stolen  stones  for  little  money. 


OPENING   THE    CRATERS  265 

Offices  were  opened  by  diamond  buyers  in  the  mining  towns, 
either  as  independent  merchants  or  as  representatives  of  large, 
foreign  wholesale  dealers  and  diamond  cutters,  and  besides  these 
established  purchasers,  there  were  a  number  of  traders  who  made 
regular  rounds  through  the  diggings,  buying  from  claim-owners 
in  their  tents  or  houses  or  at  the  sorting  table.  These  peripa- 
tetic dealers  were  familiarly  known  as  "  kopje  wallopers,"  for 
kopjes  were  the  sites  of  the  chief  surface  digging.  No  doubt 
there  were  dishonest  men  among  these  dealers,  small  and  large ; 
for  the  frequent  temptations  were  too  strong  for  slight  scruples, 
and  it  is  certain  also  that  many  diamonds  were  bought  under 
cover  by  saloon  and  shop  keepers  and  other  speculative  traders 
who  came  into  familiar  contact  with  the  diggers. 

It  is  plain  that  it  was  impossible  to  trace  or  identify  a  stolen 
diamond,  even  when  the  theft  was  known,  and  great  quantities 
of  gems  were  secretly  bought  and  carried  to  the  coast  towns 
for  sale  or  forwarded  stealthily  to  foreign  markets.  It  has  been 
estimated  that  fully  fifty  per  cent  of  the  diamonds  taken  from 
the  diggings  in  the  early  years  were  secreted  and  sold  specula- 
tively.  This  is  undoubtedly  an  extravagant  reckoning,  but 
there  is  no  question  that  a  large  percentage  were  filched  away. 

To  give  some  idea  of  the  enormous  quantity  of  diamonds 
that  were  stolen  in  the  early  days  of  the  fields,  and  before  the 
compound  system  was  adopted,  the  following  notice  is  repro- 
duced :  — 

NOTICE 

The  undermentioned  rough  and  uncut  diamonds  having  from  time 
to  time  been  recovered  by  this  Department,  notice  is  hereby  given  to  all 
whom  it  may  concern,  that  unless  proof  of  the  bona  fide  right  to  the 
possession  of  such  diamonds  be  given,  or  a  proper  permit  for  the  same 
be  produced  within  ten  days  from  the  date  hereof,  such  diamonds  will  be 
sold  and  the  proceeds  of  such  sale  carried  to  the  account  of  the  Govern- 
ment. 

JOHN  FRY, 

Chief  of  Detective  Department  of  Griqualand  West. 
MAY  24th,  1883. 


266      THE   DIAMOND    MINES    OF    SOUTH    AFRICA 

Underneath  the  notice  was  a  schedule  showing - 
The  number  of  carats.          From  whom  recovered.          How  acquired. 

The  number  of  carats  ranged  from  half  a  carat  to  6375 
carats,  which  were  found  in  the  possession  of  one  man.  The 
total  number  reached  8443  carats,  which  were  recovered  from 
fifty  persons.  Two  days  later  a  similar  notice  appeared  stating 
that  1573^  carats  had  been  recovered,  having  been  found  in  the 
possession  of  a  well-known  dealer  in  illicit  diamonds.  The 
total  value  of  these  two  lots  would  amount  to  ,£30,000  or 
^40,000. 

The  practice  of  illicit  diamond  buying  was  so  persistent  and 
obnoxious  that  it  was  curtly  styled  I.  D.  B.,  and  the  strictest 
possible  regulations  were  made  to  check  it  and  punish  offenders. 
A  Special  Court  was  established  in  1880 !  to  try  cases  of  this  kind, 
and  a  special  police  force  formed  with  warrant  to  make  the  most 
rigorous  search  of  suspected  thieves  and  receivers.  Under  the 
Diamond  Trade  Act  every  parcel  of  diamonds  taken  from  the 
Fields  must  be  formally  described  and  registered,  and  every 
transfer  recorded  from  the  date  of  discovery  till  the  final  ship- 
ment from  the  Cape  Colony.  No  person  was  permitted  to  deal 
in  diamonds  unless  he  held  a  formal  license,  and  his  record  books 
of  purchase  and  sale  were  always  open  to  police  inspection. 
Thefts  of  diamonds  and  illicit  purchasers  were  punished  with  all 
possible  rigor. 

1  A  Special  Court  was  established  under  ordinance  No.  8  of  1880.  A  barrister 
was  appointed  as  Special  Magistrate  to  act  with  the  Resident  Magistrate  and  the 
Additional  Resident  Magistrate.  Under  Act  No.  48  of  1882  the  Special  Court  for 
mining  offences  consisted  of  three  persons,  of  whom  at  least  one  was  a  judge  of  the 
Supreme  Court.  The  other  two  were  usually  the  Resident  Magistrate  and  the  Civil 
Commissioner.  By  proclamation  No.  144,  dated  September  I,  1882,  the  districts 
of  Kimberley,  Herbert,  Hay,  and  Barkly  were  within  the  jurisdiction  of  the  Special 
Court.  Act  No.  34  of  1888  provided  that  the  Special  Court  should  consist  of  three 
members,  two  of  whom  must  be  judges  of  the  Supreme  Court.  Persons  convicted 
by  the  Special  Court  might  appeal  to  the  Supreme  Court. 


CHAPTER   IX 


THE    MOVING    MEN 

N  the  rush  of  adventurers  over  the  Diamond 
Fields  the  individual  was  inevitably  merged  in 
the  mass.  He  might  feel  the  pulse  of  latent 
powers,  the  unslaked  thirst  of  ambition,  but 
he  must  be  for  the  time  no  more  than  a  drop 
of  water  in  the  rapid,  a  locust  in  the  swarm. 
He  was  one  of  a  myriad  which  exulted  in  the  enforced  equality 
of  living  and  opportunity. 

There  can  scarcely  be  a  purer  democracy  than  an  infant 
camp  in  such  a  field.  Imperial  sovereignty  or  feeble  state  asser- 
tion barely  cast  a  shadow  of  authority  over  the  stretch  of  "  No 
Man's  Land,"  the  chrysalis  of  the  Colony  of  Griqualand  West. 
One  man  here  was  as  good  as  another  in  his  own  mind,  and  free 
to  maintain  it.  In  the  seething  stream  of  humanity  that  poured 
into  the  Diamond  Fields  it  mattered  not  whether  one  was  to  the 
manor  born  or  cradled  in  a  manger,  the  son  of  a  peer  or  a  beg- 
gar's brat.  In  the  hot  scramble  for  diamonds  in  the  dirt,  all 
ranks  were  levelled.  The  rough  sailor  jostled  the  captain,  the 
university  graduate  swung  his  pick  side  by  side  with  the  navvy, 
and  the  last  of  the  Vere  de  Veres  snored  in  his  sheepskin  kaross 
back  to  back  with  a  hopeless  Japhet.  The  representative 
"Diggers'  Committee"  was  merely  the  executive  hand  of  the 
body  of  prospectors,  the  instrument  of  the  will  of  the  masses. 
The  distribution  of  the  diamond  beds  from  the  start  marked 
the  strain  for  equality,  the  hostility  to  aggrandizement ;  and  the 
relation  of  demand  to  supply  compelled  the  division  into  little 
patches  of  holdings.  It  was  years  before  the  acquisition  of  more 
than  two  claims  by  one  person  was  tolerated,  and  only  imperious 

267 


268       THE   DIAMOND    MINES   OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


necessity  forced  the  further  consolidation  of  claims  when  the 
mines  had  reached  a  depth  that  made  patch-working  impracticable. 
In  this  mass  movement  and  equalizing  of  opportunity,  the 
rise  and  display  of  strong  individuality  were  necessarily  subdued 
and  slow  to  appear.  In  the  years  of  the  rush  and  the  early 
advance  of  the  mines,  it  is  the  life  of  the  mass  and  not  of  the 
fractional  unit  that  makes  the  history  of  the  Fields.  But  with 
changing  conditions,  as  the  years  rolled  on,  the  way  was  opened 
for  individual  assertion,  influence,  and  distinction.  Then  the 
men,  hitherto  unmarked,  stood  up  preeminent.  Then  the  brains 
that  were  capable  of  great  conceptions  and  great  performances 
found  pressing  occasion  for  all  their  foresight  and  energy.  The 
history  of  the  great  mines  that  have  explored  the  diamond-bear- 
ing craters  so  far  beyond  the  pitfalls  of  the  prospecting  diggers 
is  very  essentially  a  story  of  remarkable  men. 

In  July,  1873,  a  young  Hebrew,  Barnett  Isaacs,  took  passage 
from  England  to  Cape  Town  at  the  call  of  his  brother  from  the 

new  Diamond  Fields.  His 
grandfather  was  a  learned  and 
honored  rabbi,  and  the  good 
standing  of  his  family  was 
marked  by  the  marriage  of 
his  father,  Isaac  Isaacs,  to  a 
relative  of  Sir  George  Jessels, 
Master  of  the  Rolls.  But  the 
son  of  the  rabbi  was  only  a 
small,  plodding,  frugal  shop- 
keeper in  London.  His  sons, 
Henry  and  Barnett,  were 
trained  in  the  excellent  He- 
brew Free  School  in  Spital- 
fields,but  both  boys  left  school 
at  the  age  of  fourteen  to  help  their  father  in  his  shop.  Henry 
was  drawn  away  in  the  current  of  the  early  rush  to  the  Diamond 
Fields  in  1871,  and  had  such  success  as  a  kopje  walloper  that  he 
wrote  home  to  urge  his  brother  to  join  him. 


Barnett  Isaacs. 


THE    MOVING    MEN  269 

To  the  restless  spirit  and  purely  speculative  mind  of  Barnett 
Isaacs  there  was  magnetic  attraction  in  such  a  field  with  its 
novel  and  gleaming  opportunities.  With  instant  decision  he 
took  the  steamer  for  Cape  Town,  and  made  the  tiresome  trip 
over  veld  and  karoo  to  Kimberley  with  unfailing  pluck  and 
good  temper. 

He  was  only  twenty  years  old,  and  outwardly  no  more  than 
a  light-hearted  boy,  bubbling  over  with  high  spirits  and  comical 
conceits.  But  his  fondness  for  athletic  sports,  theatrical  extrava- 
ganzas, and  practical  jokes,  and  his  contempt  for  conventional 
restraints,  were  merely  the  surface  froth  covering  invincible 
energy  and  facile  grasp  of  opportunities.  He  had  an  unshak- 
able self-reliance,  a  quick  perception,  and  a  fertile  resourceful- 
ness that  bore  him  up  when  feebler  men  sank.  One  could 
scarcely  cast  him  in  any  society  or  any  place  on  earth,  where  his 
nimble  wits  would  not  win  him  a  living. 

The  impulse  to  go  ahead  was  in  his  blood.  "  It  has  always 
been  a  superstition  with  me,"  he  said,  "  never  to  turn  back." 
He  grew  apace  with  the  calls  upon  his  powers.  He  did  not  pro- 
fess to  know  more  than  he  knew,  but  he  was  never  content  to 
know  anything  that  interested  him  by  report.  "  I  must  look 
into  everything  that  concerns  me  for  myself."  This  determina- 
tion was  a  safeguard.  He  once  boasted,  in  a  rare  fit  of  parade, 
that  he  had  never  made  a  mistake  in  his  investment  of  money 
in  his  life.  But  his  incessant  activity  was  fatally  wearing.  He 
could  not  dawdle.  He  could  hardly  rest.  For  many  years  his 
extraordinary  vitality  and  endurance  kept  him  running.  He 
had  the  precious  faculty  of  dropping  off  to  sleep  at  any  moment 
of  relaxation,  and  awaking  after  slumbering  for  a  few  moments. 
Nevertheless  no  creature  of  flesh  and  blood  could  endure  the 
strain  which  he  bore  and  recklessly  courted.  "  Some  day  such 
a  bundle  of  quivering  nerves  must  snap,  either  life  or  brain  must 
go,"  said  one  of  his  closest  friends.  But  when  young  Barnett 
Isaacs  wandered  into  Dutoitspan,  "  fit  for  anything,"  as  he  him- 
self declared,  after  his  long  tramp  and  meals  of  porridge  and 
biltong,  nobody  saw  in  him  the  raw  material  of  one  of  the 


27o      THE    DIAMOND    MINES   OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

remarkable  financiers  of  the  century,  or  forecast,  even  dimly,  the 
meteoric  career  of  Barney  Barnato. 

His  brother  Henry  had  fancied  and  taken  the  name  of  Bar- 
nato, as  a  professional  shift  from  his  own  family  name,  when  he 
first  came  to  the  Diamond  Fields  and  tried  his  luck  first  as  a 
conjurer  and  vaudeville  performer,  relying  upon  the  sleight  of 
hand  proficiency  which  he  had  gained  in  boyish  practice  to 
amuse  his  friends.  Henry  soon  turned  his  hand  to  the  more 
profitable  business  of  a  diamond  trader,  but  his  stage  name  stuck 
to  him,  and  passed  naturally  to  his  younger  brother,  who  accepted 
it  with  easy  indifference.  So  young  Barnett  Isaacs  became 
familiarly  known  as  "  Barney  Barnato,"  and  for  the  first  year 
or  two  of  his  life  on  the  Diamond  Fields  floated  along  in  the 
current  as  "  Harry  Barnato's  brother."  But  his  head  never 
sank  below  the  surface  for  a  moment.  His  first  buoy  was 
a  cigar  box.  He  had  money  enough  to  buy  sixty  boxes  of 
cigars  after  paying  his  way  to  Kimberley.  With  this  working 
capital  he  went  into  partnership  with  Louis  Cohen,  another  new- 
comer, who  had  started  as  a  kopje  walloper.  The  two  young 
Hebrews  picked  out  a  shanty  to  their  liking  for  an  office.  It 
was  a  little  tin  shed,  eight  feet  by  six,  owned  by  an  Irishman 
who  offered  it  for  rent  at  a  guinea  a  day. 

"  That  is  ridiculous,"  said  Cohen. 

"I  don't  know  that,"  said  Barnato.  "The  situation  is  good, 
why  not  pay  a  guinea  a  day  if  you  can  make  thirty  shillings  ?  " 

This  keen  measuring  was  typical.  Barney  Barnato  never 
counted  cost  alone  if  he  wanted  anything,  but  weighed  it  instantly 
against  probable  profit.  He  was  never  a  thoughtless  or  reckless 
buyer.  He  did  not  shut  his  eyes  to  the  risks  of  loss.  On  the 
contrary,  he  reckoned  risks  with  exceptional  accuracy  and  pre- 
cision of  detail,  but  he  reckoned  profits  with  the  same  even- 
balanced  judgment.  Hence  he  was  not  afraid  to  venture  when 
others  shrank  back.  He  was  naturally  sanguine.  He  had  faith 
in  himself,  and  put  all  his  working  force  into  everything  that  he 
undertook.  So  his  high-pressure  energy,  persistently  maintained, 
won  success  where  a  weaker  and  idler  man  would  have  failed. 


THE    MOVING    MEN  271 

There  was  no  peculiar  luck  in  his  favor.  Thousands  around 
him  had  equal  chances  or  better.  He  went  to  the  front  because 
he  had  the  brains  to  choose  aright  and  the  working  powers  to 
make  his  choice  profitable.  He  made  mistakes  as  men  of  his 
sanguine  temper  must,  but  he  did  not  make  many  mistakes,  and 
no  fatal  or  even  greatly  damaging  ones. 

There  is  no  business  without  risks.  The  most  prudent  man 
cannot  engage  in  mining  or  in  trading  in  mineral  products  with- 
out risks.  If  hot-headed  speculation  has  swamped  fortunes  in 
such  a  field,  it  is  no  less  certain  that  overstrained  caution  has 
failed  to  win  anything  memorable.  There  is  a  happy  and  rare 
mean  of  sagacious  judgment  in  mining  operations,  and  Barney 
Barnato  proved  his  possession  of  such  judgment  incontestably. 
His  mind  worked  so  quickly,  and  his  mental  calculations  were 
so  exact  and  minute,  that  it  was  often  supposed  that  he  jumped 
at  conclusions.  "  Barnato's  snap  judgment,"  sneered  a  man 
whom  he  outbid  in  competition ;  "  Barnato's  sheer  luck," 
growled  the  man  who  saw  his  judgment  turn  to  gold. 

The  young  partners,  Barnato  and  Cohen,  worked  hard,  early 
and  late.  Barnato's  keen  eye  gained  a  valuable  business  con- 
nection in  a  way  that  suggests  his  kinship  to  Sherlock  Holmes. 

One  of  the  most  successful  "  kopje  wallopers  "  (a  name  given 
to  men  who  visited  the  various  miners'  huts  for  the  purpose  of 
buying  diamonds)  made  regular  rounds  through  the  diamond 
fields  on  an  old,  lame,  yellow  pony,  calling  on  men  who  had 
the  best  bargains  in  diamonds  to  offer.  Barnato  and  Cohen 
tried  repeatedly  to  follow  him,  but  his  track  was  soon  lost  in 
the  labyrinth  of  tents,  huts,  and  sand  heaps.  However,  Barnato 
was  able  to  see  that  the  trader's  pony  had  the  habit  of  stopping 
at  places  where  choice  bargains  were  made,  and  when  the  broken- 
down  beast  was  offered  for  sale  one  day  by  its  owner,  Barnato 
snapped  at  the  chance  to  buy  him  for  ^£27  IQJ.,  an  enormous 
price  for  the  old  pony  as  a  steed,  but  a  great  bargain  for  the 
keen  diamond  broker,  for  the  walloper's  business  went  with  his 
pony,  as  he  afterward  saw  to  his  chagrin. 

Soon   Barnato   became   known   as   a  "  walloping    walloper," 


272       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

and  in  the  third  year  of  his  push  into  the  Fields  he  was  able 
to  crown  a  new  ambition  by  the  purchase  of  a  block  of  four 
claims  in  one  of  the  best-paying  sections  of  the  Kimberley  mine. 
His  savings  were  then  about  ^£3000,  and  he  put  nearly  every 
pound  he  was  worth  into  his  purchase.  His  seemingly  risky 
investment  was  quickly  justified  by  the  yield  of  his  claims. 
With  the  help  of  this  great  investment  he  came  swiftly  into 
prominence.  Entering  into  partnership  with  his  brother,  he 

established  the  firm  of  Bar- 
nato  Brothers  in  1880,  as  a 
London  and  Kimberley  firm 
of  diamond  dealers  and  brok- 
ers in  mining  properties,  and 
crowned  a  further  ambition 
by  combining  his  own  claims 
with  adjoining  holdings  in  his 
first  mining  stock  organiza- 
tion, "  The  Barnato  Diamond 
Mining  Company." 

He  was  one  of  many 
quick-sighted  and  resourceful 
men  who  perceived  that  the 
day  for  any  profitable  work- 
ing of  individual  claims  had 
passed,  while  the  body  of 
miners  was  still  struggling 
c.  j.  Rhodes,  when  a  student  at  Oxford.  along  blindly  in  the  great  cav- 
ing chasms.  He  brought  about  a  highly  desirable  amalgamation 
of  the  claims  which  he  controlled  with  those  of  the  Standard 
Company,  one  of  the  strongest  organizations  in  the  Kimberley 
Mines,  and  later  these  claims  were  amalgamated  with  the  hold- 
ings of  the  Kimberley  Central  Company,  in  which  he  became  a 
large  shareholder.  It  was  at  this  stage  in  his  fortunes  that  he 
came  into  keen  rivalry  with  the  only  competitor  that  could  make 
headway  successfully  against  him,  Cecil  John  Rhodes. 

There  was  a  singular  likeness  in  some  respects  in  the  careers, 


tic  was  able 
block   of  four 
Kimberley  mine. 
put  nearly  every 
-  seemingly  risky 
id    of    his    claims. 
ici  came  swiftly  into 
virh    his   brother,   he 
i    the  firm   of  Bar- 
ters  in    1880,  as  a 
tnd   Kimberley  firm 
<>nd  dealers  and  brok- 
•.•mirig  properties,  and 
i    further    ambition 
";mng  his  own  claims 
: K.uning  holdings  in  his 
•;:ing    stock    organiza- 

PORTRAIT   OF   CECIL  JOHN    RHQD^SBarnato  Diamond 

<.  ompany." 
was     one     of    many 
sighted  and  resourceful 
\ho   perceived   that  the 
.lav    for  any   profitable  work- 
< -t   individual   claims   had 
while     the    body    of 
v(  as     still     struggling 
ti- nelly  in  the  great  cav- 
desirable  amalgamation 
>->e  of  the  Standard 
•  •'is  in  the  Kimberley 
:<!.-.•. rmted   with   the  hold- 
in  which  he  became  a 
in   his  fortunes  that  he 
-'pe'itor  that  could  make 
i  John  Rhodes. 
•  ;IIH'  respects  in  the  careers, 


THE    MOVING    MEN  273 

conceptions,  and  calculations  of  these  extraordinary  men,  although 
they  were  so  markedly  dissimilar  in  personal  appearance  and 
temperament.  Cecil  John  Rhodes  was  the  fifth  son  of  a  Hert- 
fordshire clergyman  and  came  to  South  Africa  as  a  sickly  boy 
of  seventeen,  arriving  in  Durban,  September  i,  1870,  in  the  first 
flush  of  the  diamond  fever,  to  join  his  eldest  brother  Herbert 
on  a  small  cotton  plantation  in  Natal.  Early  in  1871  Herbert 
Rhodes,  leaving  his  brother  in  charge  of  the  plantation,  joined 
the  great  rush  to  the  New  Diamond  Fields.  Cecil  Rhodes 
followed  a  few  months  later,  and  arrived  on  the  Fields  in  June. 
The  raw,  dusty  Diamond  Fields  were  apparently  one  of  the  spots 
least  likely  to  attract  a  youth  whose  health  had  broken  down,  and 
whose  tastes  were  bent  from  early  childhood  toward  a  scholar's 
life  in  the  cloisters  of  a  university  appealing  to  every  high 
imagination  in  its  memorials  of  every  age  since  the  dawn  of 
letters  in  Britain.  So  indeed  it  seemed  when  young  Rhodes 
turned  his  back  on  the  glitter  of  the  new  mines  and  returned 
to  England. 

His  name  had  been  entered  on  the  rolls  of  Oriel  College, 
Oxford,  before  his  departure  for  South  Africa.  Rhodes  passed 
the  matriculation  examination  during  October,  1873.  But  the 
following  year  saw  his  return  to  Kimberley,  because  of  a  lung 
fever  that  threatened  his  life,  and  made  the  shift  from  misty 
England  to  the  mild  clear  air  of  the  high  veld  an  imperative 
prescription.  Shortly  after  his  return  Herbert  Rhodes  left  the 
Diamond  Fields  to  follow  the  more  congenial  life  of  an  explorer 
and  hunter  in  the  interior  of  Africa,  where  he  was  burned  to 
death  in  September,  1879,  while  sleeping  in  a  grass  hut  which 
took  light  from  the  camp  fire.1 

Another  brother,  Francis  W.  Rhodes  (Col.  Frank  Rhodes, 
the  distinguished  soldier),  joined  his  brothers  for  a  short  time. 

I  have  been  able,  through  the  kindness  of  Mr.  J.  Dick- 
Lauder,  one  of  the  early  diggers  on  the  Fields,  to  reproduce 
some  old  photographs  depicting  the  early  camp  life  at  De 
Beers  and  showing  Cecil  Rhodes  and  others  sorting  the  yellow 

1  "  Cecil  Rhodes,"  by  Howard  Hensman,  1901. 


274      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

ground  for  diamonds.  See  illustration  between  pages  274 
and  275. 

So  unknown  to  each  other  and  blind  to  their  future  clash 
and  union,  Cecil  John  Rhodes,  the  clergyman's  son,  and  Barney 
Barnato,  the  London  shopboy,  started  abreast  in  the  race  for 
fortune  on  the  same  track.  An  ordinary  observer  of  the  two 
young  men  would  probably  have  picked  Barnato  as  the  winner 
on  such  a  track  as  the  new  Diamond  Fields.  Any  one  could  see 
at  a  glance  that  the  young  Hebrew  was  unsinkable,  and  pecul- 
iarly fitted  to  make  a  good  living  in  the  stirring  towns  by  his 
business  training,  quick  wit,  and  racial  genius  for  trade,  while 
the  English  college  student  had  no  apparent  fitting  for  success 
either  as  a  digger  or  a  business  man.  Kipling  has  told  of  the 
straining  of  the  new  ship,  as  a  living  thing,  in  the  trial  to  find 
herself,  and  this  fine  conception  has  literal  truth  in  the  applica- 
tion to  young  manhood.  So  Cecil  John  Rhodes  was  forced  to 
find  himself,  as  he  did,  when  he  put  away  his  books  to  plunge 
into  the  whirling  life  of  the  Great  White  Camps. 

Tall,  gaunt,  shy,  the  stripling  sat  at  the  diamond  sorting 
table,  overseeing  the  Kafirs  who  scraped  over  the  pebbles  from 
his  brother's  claim,  on  a  little  "  floor  "  near  the  edge  of  the  big 
Kimberley  pit.  Roughly  dressed,  coated  with  dust,  disdainful 
of  any  foppish  touch,  peculiarly  self-contained,  full  of  novel  ideas 
and  aspirations  rising,  turning,  and  shaping  themselves  in  his 
mind,  he  was  not  one  to  mingle,  like  Barnato,  in  every  stir 
of  the  froth  in  the  camps,  or  ready  to  jump,  like  the  London 
shopboy,  into  any  gush  of  speculation,  from  a  bet  at  cards  to  an 
auction  sale.  Externally  the  two  young  men  could  scarcely  be 
more  unlike  than  the  little,  chunky,  bullet-headed,  near-sighted, 
mercurial  Hebrew,  taking  a  hand  in  current  sport  or  traffic,  and 
the  tall,  thoughtful,  young  overseer,  sitting  moodily  on  a  bucket, 
deaf  to  the  chatter  and  rattle  about  him,  and  fixing  his  blue  eyes 
intently  on  his  work,  or  on  some  fabric  of  his  brain. 

Yet  both  were  alike  in  their  expanding  ambition  and  power 
to  grapple  and  mould  in  their  distinctive  ways  the  opportunities 
about  them.  Both  had  keen  foresight,  and  extraordinary  com- 


.no  g; 


274       THE    DIAMOND    Mf\KS    OF    SOUTH     AFRICA 

ground     for    JUKI  illustration    bti*een    pages    274 

arui    275. 

/ier  and   blind   ro   their  future  clash 

and  union,  >  ie%  the  clergyman's  son,  and  Barney 

Barrnr  >  .'.opboy,   started   abreast  in   the  race  for 

An   ordinary   observer  of  the  two 

:>abiv  have  picked  Barnato  as  the  winner 

evv  Diamond  {•  it-ids.     Any  one  could  see 

at  a  t  tha:    ;he  young    Hebrc  -  uas   unsinkable,  and  pecul- 

r  in   rhe  stirring  towns  by  his 
.ui!  genius  for  trade,  while 
ue  studt-ir  >  apparent  fitting  for  success 

in. UK      Kipling  has  told  of  the 
:-ig  thing,  in   the  trial  to  find 
•  i.is  literal  truth  in  the  applica- 
From  Left  to  Righthn    Rhodes  was  forced  to 
J.  Dick  Lauder,  shovelling.  Frank  ^od^soglng      , 

N.  Garstin,  screening.  ,   v,  -Dr.  Atherstone,  looking  dn. 

Herbert  Rhodes,  screening.  Cecil  Rhodes,  sorting. 

Macleod,  sorting.  '  Nesfcit.ibrtiri^1111 

;f  rs  wiu>  sci aped  over  the  pebbles  from 

'i-tlc  "  floor"  near  rhe  edge  of  the  big 
dressed,  coated  with  dust,  disdainful 
/Marly  self-contained,  full  of  novel  ideas 
.lining,  and   shaping   themselves  in   his 
>   mingle,   like    Harnato,  in   every  stir 
ivady   to  jump,   like  the   London 
•culation,  from  a.  bet  at  cards  to  an 
•oung  men  could  scarcely  be 
-headed,  near-sighted, 
\.rj-cnr  sport  or  traffic,  and 
oversee  moodily  on  a  bucket, 

,  and  fixing  his  blue  eyes 
>n  some  hNnc  of  I; is  brain. 

uiing  ambition  and  power 

••p  «   and  ;^!i!..         -.  their  disti.'.^n  .  e  ways  the  opportunities 

:   foresight,  and   extraordinary  com- 


Standing. 

N.  Garstin. 
Macleod. 
Cecil  Rhodes. 
Frank  Rhodes. 
Nesbit. 


From  Left  to  Right. 


Sitting. 

Herbert  Rhodes. 
Dr.  Atherstone. 

Up  the  Trie. 

].  Dick  Lauder. 


prehension  of  g; 

essential   poi  uracy 

and  punctur;  Wi 

same  end  of  _ 

making,  of  u; 

of  proving  to  the   •• 

chieflx 

throw  the  s 
Dark  Contin 


THE    MOVING    MEN 


275 


Silver  Trees.     (These  trees  grow  only  on  the  slopes  of  Table  Mountain.) 

prehension  of  great  financial  undertakings.  Both  had,  too,  the 
essential  poise  and  accuracy  of  judgment  that  shuns  pitfalls 
and  punctures  illusions.  With  variant  motives  they  sought  the 
same  end  of  great  riches  :  one  for  the  sheer  satisfaction  of  money 
making,  of  unfolding  great  schemes  of  production  and  flotation, 
of  proving  to  the  world  that  he  was  a  master  of  finance ;  the 
other  chiefly  as  a  means  to  reach  ends  of  Imperial  scope,  to 
throw  the  searchlights  of  civilization  into  every  cranny  of  the 
Dark  Continent,  to  lift  the  prodigious  dead  weight  of  unnumbered 


276      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


bygone  ages  of  barbarism,  to  make  the  waste  lands  fruitful  and 
open  the  arteries  of  traffic,  to  create  a  Greater  Britain  than  the 
most  daring  fancy  before  him  had  conceived,  and  stretch  the 
hand  of  his  Queen  over  a  realm  transcending  the  farthest  sweep 
of  the  Macedonian  or  the  Roman. 

Both  realized  very  keenly  the  practical  necessity  of  effecting 
combinations  of  the  claims  covering  the  diamond  mines  in  order 
to  provide  a  uniform  and  efficient  development  and  to  secure 
a  scarcely  less  essential  control  of  the  diamond  output.  The 
patent  collapse  of  the  open  pit  mining  forced  the  undertaking 
of  underground  works,  and  compelled  the  further  consolidation 

of  holdings ;  but 
for  too  many  years 
there  was  no  com- 
mon realization  of 
the  urgent  need  of 
the  systematic  de- 
velopment of  the 
mines  as  a  united 
property,  and  not 
as  a  complex  col- 
lection of  discord- 

A  Cape  Cart.  ant        parts.          The 

working  of  the  parts  was  at  best  cramped  and  conflicting.  The 
prosecution  of  any  well-designed  plan  was  heavily  handicapped 
by  the  lack  of  cooperation  in  adjoining  properties. 

This  was  sharply  etched  in  by  Barnato  after  Rhodes  had 
successfully  pressed  the  amalgamation  of  the  variant  interests. 
"  I  think  I  can  prove  to  you,  gentlemen,"  he  said,  in  addressing 
a  shareholders'  meeting  in  1889,  "that  in  order  to  work  the 
underground  system,  you  must  have  the  mines  intact.  You  all 
remember  the  trouble  and  friction  that  took  place  when  the  De 
Beers  mine  was  being  worked  by  the  De  Beers  Company,  the 
Victoria,  the  Oriental,  the  Elma,  the  Gem,  and  others.  Why 
was  the  underground  system  not  a  success  in  this  case  ?  Because 
one  company  was  working  against  another;  that  is  to  say,  if  one 


VII 


KIMBERLEY  MINE 


VIII 


IX 


XIY 


Xlli 


XII 


XI 


IX 


Ylll 


VII 


IV 


let-ten  "A"  lo  "H"  n»Te  been  substituted 
for  names  on  plan  for  lack  of  space. 

A  MOOR  &  BERNARD 

B  FRIESLICH 

C  WOLHUTER  A   BLANCH 

D  FEW  &   PI8TORIUS 

F  I.    ROBINSON 

r  MATTHEWS,  ANDERSON  4  MATHIESON 

G  LAMB  4  HOOD 

H  WALLI8  A  HAWKINS 

Claims   in  black  belonged 
to  W.  A.  Hall. 


iHtiuvu  ir  ipmir  *  eo.,  N.T 


on-.--  -,r  >.  aoo;/     A 


r-ssf38*53 

.•%A.aariplS^»fc. 


• 

"teSJI 

i,f-    i  :i.i  •<•   ?T.  : 

-5*.     ;•"—  '"•!„.          Wi          f- 


THE    MOVING   MEN 


277 


company  was  on  the  five  hundred  feet  level,  the  opposing  com- 
panies could  go  and  eat  into  each  other's  boundary  walls  and 
pillars  to  such  a  dangerous  extent  that  the  entire  mine  was  in 
a  condition  which  threatened  collapse  at  any  moment." 

This  was  so  patently  true,  and  more  particularly  in  Kimber- 
ley  mine,  that  it  may  seem  surprising  that  the  disastrous  conflict 
was  so  long  maintained.  But  it  must  be  borne  in  mind  that 
the  average  shareholder  was  not  as  quick  to  see  and  prompt  to 
move  for  a  remedy  as  Rhodes,  and  comparatively  few  had  his 
intimate  and  comprehensive  knowledge  of  the  condition  of  all 
the  mines  in  the  Fields.  A  very  large  proportion  of  the  investors 
in  these  mines  were  men  who  had  never  been  on  the  Fields  at  all, 
or  whose  acquaintance  was  limited  to  a  sightseer's  visit.  Many, 
too,  had  bought  shares  simply  as  a  gamble  in  the  stock  market, 
and  only  welcomed  such  information  or  reports  as  were  calculated 
to  boom  their  speculations. 

It  was  obviously  labor  lost  to  attempt  to  interest  such  men 
in  any  far-reaching  plan  for  the  union  and  systematic  develop- 
ment of  all  the  mining  claims  in  the  craters,  and  most  of  them 
would  have  sneered  it  away  as  a  mere  chimera  if  it  had  been  laid 
before  them.  This  was  indeed  a  project  which  might  well  have 
appalled  an  ordinary  man,  even  if  he  had  the  clear  sight  and 
comprehension  of  the  position  essential  to  a  true  judgment. 
Anybody  might  dream  of  such  a  gigantic  combination,  and  some 
day-dreamer  might  babble  about  it  to  his  gossips,  but  what  man, 
or  association  of  men,  would  have  the  foresight  and  patience,  the 
perseverance  and  tact,  the  integrity  and  fulness  of  talent,  to  push 
forward  toward  it  for  years,  to  thrust  aside  or  crush  blocks  in 
the  way,  to  harmonize  discordant  and  jealous  interests,  to  open 
the  eyes  of  narrow-sighted  selfishness,  to  win  the  confidence  of 
the  distrustful,  to  design  a  scheme  of  union  that  would  make  all 
holders  of  good  working  claims  common  shareholders  on  a  basis 
of  equity  and  assured  profit  to  all,  and  finally  to  provide  the 
enormous  capital  necessary  for  the  consummation  of  the  scheme, 
and  the  development  of  the  great  diamond  mines  in  a  really 
great  way  ? 


278       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

Here  was  a  task  of  such  tremendous  magnitude  and  difficulty 
that  men  of  good  ordinary  judgment  might  well  question  its 
feasibility.  What  man  in  or  out  of  the  Fields  would  dare  attempt 
it  ?  Who  could  do  it,  if  he  dared  to  venture  ?  There  is  a  mighty 
fillip  to  the  conceit  of  man,  that  in  such  great  exigencies  as  these 
—  in  times  when  some  prodigious  undertaking  is  imperatively 
needed  —  the  man  or  men  who  can  carry  it  on  to  completion 
are  almost  always  forthcoming.  "  Nothing  is  impossible  nowa- 
days," said  the  "  Bonanza  King,"  Flood,  when  doubts  were 
raised  of  the  practicability  of  piping  water  from  the  Sierra 
Nevada  Mountains  to  the  Comstock  Silver  Mines  on  the 
Virginia  range  ;  "  the  only  question  is,  will  it  pay  ?  "  That 
seems,  indeed,  the  only  touchstone  which  men  of  such  pith  and 
temper  are  disposed  to  apply  to  any  object.  It  was  again  made 
evident  on  South  African  Diamond  Fields  how  far  the  possible 
stretches  when  men  with  Flood's  touchstone  are  the  adven- 
turers. The  moving  men,  who  could  comprehend  the  need  for 
union  and  effect  it,  came  irresistibly  to  the  front  in  the  Fields. 

The  undertaking  to  which  they  set  their  hands  should  be 
clearly  set  forth.  In  spite  of  the  ruin  of  the  open  mine  work- 
ings in  the  competing  development  scramble,  and  in  spite  of  the 
continuing  conflict  and  recurrent  disasters  in  the  underground 
mining  so  cogently  enforcing  the  call  for  union,  there  were 
still,  at  the  end  of  1885,  no  less  than  ninety-eight  separate  hold- 
ings in  the  four  mines.  In  Kimberley  mine  there  were  eleven 
companies  and  eight  private  holdings  ;  in  De  Beers  there  were 
seven  companies  and  three  private  holdings  ;  in  Dutoitspan,  six- 
teen companies  and  twenty-one  private  holdings ;  in  Bultfontein, 
eight  companies  and  twenty-four  private  holdings.  Thus  the  four 
mines  were  operated  by  a  total  of  forty-two  companies  and  fifty- 
six  private  firms  or  persons,  all  clashing  within  a  surface  area 
of  70  acres.  The  original  location  claims,  aggregating  3600, 
had  been  united  to  this  extent,  merely,  at  the  close  of  fourteen 
years  of  mining  on  the  helter-skelter  plan. 

It  is  hardly  just  to  credit  Rhodes  and  Barney  Barnato  with 
an  equal  perception  of  the  imperative  call  for  the  union  of  all 


THE    MOVING   MEN 


279 


Mr.  C.  D.  Rudd. 


the  discordant  interests  in  the  diamond  mines.      Each  reached 

the   conclusion   that  it  was  no  longer   possible   to   continue  to 

work  the  mines  divided  into  small 

holdings  which  were  controlled  by 

men  antagonistic  to   one   another. 

Rhodes's  interests  were  mostly  in 

De     Beers     mine,    and     Barnato's 

largely  in  the  Kimberley  mine.    In 

the  same  year,  1880,  in  which  Bar- 

nato    floated   successfully   his   first 

diamond-mining  corporation,  "The 

Barnato   Mining  Company,"   con- 
sisting of  a  few  claims   in  a   rich 

section    of  the    Kimberley    mine, 

Rhodes   and  others  founded  the  De   Beers   Mining  Company, 

on  the  contiguous  diamond-bearing  crater. 

It  is  of  interest  in  this  connection  to  trace  the  origin  of  De 

Beers  Mining  Company  through 
the  early  years  of  De  Beers  mine. 
In  1 873  Rhodes  united  his  claims 
in  De  Beers  mine  with  those  of 
C.  D.  Rudd,  and  they  slowly  in- 
creased their  holdings.  Robert 
Graham  joined  them  in  1874, 
and  later  Runchman,  Hoskyns 
&  Puzey  took  part  with  them  in 
the  purchase  of  Baxter's  holdings. 
This  combination,  in  addition  to 
mining  their  own  ground,  took 
pumping  contracts  to  drain  the 
mine.  Besides  the  above  combi- 
nation there  were  other  competi- 
tors for  the  purchase  of  claims, 
such  as  Dunsmure  &  Alderson, 

Stow  &  English,  and  these  three  firms  gradually  acquired  all  the 

best  ground  in  De  Beers  mine  except  the  Elma  Company,  owned 


Mr.  Robert  English. 


28o      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

by  Thomas  Shiels  and  others,  the  Victoria  Company  in  which 
J.  Ferguson  was  then  the  leading  spirit,  and  the  United  Dia- 
mond Mining  Company. 

The  De  Beers  Mining  Company  was  formed  on  the  ist  of 
April,  1880,  with  a  capital  of  ^200,000,  by  the  union  of  the 
three  firms  first  mentioned.  It  progressed  with  extraordinary 
success,  extending  its  range  of  ownership,  absorbing  step  by  step 
its  floundering  neighbors,  and  finally  standing  out  preeminent 
in  March,  1885,  with  a  capital  of  ,£841,550,  upon  which  divi- 
dends of  7-|  per  cent  had  been  paid  during  the  last  fiscal  year, 
in  spite  of  the  heavy  charges  of  development  work  and  the  un- 
avoidable hampering  of  its  mining  operations.  Mr.  Rudd  states 
that  at  one  time  Rhodes  and  he  had  the  offer  of  the  entire  De 
Beers  mine  for  £"6,000,  and  they  walked  about  a  whole  day 
talking  it  over,  but  finally  decided  they  could  not  finance  it. 
The  licenses  at  that  time  were  so  costly  that  it  was  thought  wise 
not  to  risk  the  purchase.  Money  was  not  very  plentiful  among 
these  men  in  those  days,  as  is  shown  by  one  of  the  first  checks 
of  the  De  Beers  Mining  Company,  which  was  drawn  by  Rhodes 
in  his  own  favor  for  £5,  "as  an  advance  against  his  salary  as 
secretary." 

It  is  possible  that  Barnato  may  have  tried  to  bring  about  a 
further  consolidation  of  some  of  the  various  interests  in  Kim- 
berley  mine,  but  there  is  nothing  to  show  that  he  contemplated 
any  broad  scheme. 

For  nearly  six  years  Rhodes  concentrated  his  efforts  in  the 
Diamond  Fields  toward  obtaining  complete  control  of  De  Beers 
mine  by  himself  and  his  chosen  friends,  and  he  brought  about 
this  consolidation  of  all  the  holdings  in  May,  1887.  His 
master  mind  was  steadfastly  bent  on  the  attainment  of  the  con- 
trol of  the  development  and  output  of  the  four  great  diamond- 
producing  mines  of  South  Africa,  and  his  work  of  first  uniting 
all  the  interests  in  De  Beers  mine  was  but  the  beginning  of  his 
great  dream.  The  range  for  amalgamation  of  the  four  mines 
was  so  great  that  no  single  man,  however  ambitious,  could  hope 
to  cover  it  by  any  single-handed  effort.  The  consolidation  of 


THE    MOVING    MEN  281 

all  the  companies  in  De  Beers  mine  was  on  the  lines  conceived 
by  Rhodes,  and  carried  out  by  the  support  given  him  by  the 
leading  men  who  were  interested  in  the  various  companies. 

Up  to  this  time  there  was  no  rivalry  between  Rhodes  and 
Barnato,  for  no  measures  had  been  taken  by  Rhodes  to  obtain 
a  footing  in  Kimberley  mine.  The  first  steps  taken  in  this 
direction  were  to  try  to  purchase  the  claims  in  the  west  end  of 
the  Kimberley  mine  held  by  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope  bank, 
and  known  as  W.  A.  Hall's  claims.  This  was  in  the  beginning 
of  May,  1887.  Unfortunately,  however,  for  Rhodes's  scheme, 
these  claims  had  already  been  offered  to  a  syndicate  in  London, 
headed  by  Sir  Donald  Currie,  and  were  purchased  by  that  syndi- 
cate for  £  1 1 0,000.  The  plan  which  Rhodes  had  in  his  mind 
was  to  purchase  these  claims,  and  also  to  purchase  the  claims 
of  the  "  Compagnie  Fra^aise  des  Mines  de  Diamant  du  Cap 
de  Bon  Esperance,"  known  as  the  "  French  Company."  The 
"  French  Company "  held  a  block  of  claims  which  ran  nearly 
across  the  mine  from  north  to  south,  and  divided  the  holdings 

o 

of  the  Central  Company.  It  also  held  a  block  of  claims  adjoin- 
ing those  of  W.  A.  Hall,  but  these  were  not  connected  with  the 
main  body  of  their  claims,  being  separated  by  the  intervening 
claims  of  the  Central  Company.  These  two  companies  were 
so  antagonistic  to  one  another  that  neither  would  allow  the 
divided  blocks  of  ground  to  be  worked  by  means  of  tunnels 
driven  through  the  diamond-bearing  ground  of  the  opposing 
company.  The  Central  Company  worked  its  claims  by  two 
separate  shafts  sunk  in  the  blue  ground  at  the  bottom  of  the 
open  mine,  and  the  ground  hoisted  in  the  shafts  was  sent  to  the 
surface  by  means  of  aerial  trams,  while  the  "  French  Company  " 
was  compelled  to  drive  tunnels  into  the  walls  of  the  mine  adjoin- 
ing the  claims  and  connect  them  by  a  cross  tunnel,  as  they  were 
working  through  one  shaft  only. 

To  create  a  powerful  company  in  Kimberley  mine  was  sub- 
stantially all  that  the  leading  men  in  that  mine  had  been  work- 
ing for,  but  this  was  far  from  satisfying  Rhodes.  Barnato  viewed 
the  situation  as  a  speculator  and  investor.  Money  making 


282       THE    DIAMOND    MINES   OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


7  OF   THE 

(i    UNIVERSITY 


THE   MOVING   MEN  283 

through  mining  on  a  sound  basis  was  avowedly  the  limit  of  his 
scheme,  apart  from  a  natural  pride  in  figuring  as  the  foremost 
operator  in  these  marvellous  Diamond  Fields,  and  a  rising  star 
of  the  first  magnitude  on  the  London  Stock  Exchange.  But  the 
assurance  of  money  making  was,  at  most,  a  minor  consideration 
with  Rhodes.  He,  too,  valued  money  highly,  but  not  for  the 
bare  delight  in  piling  it  up  or  for  the  luxuries  which  it  would 
purchase.  Great  wealth  was  to  him  the  essential  means  for  the 
furtherance  of  great  plans.  He  wanted  millions  in  hand,  or  the 
assured  control  of  millions,  to  push  his  design  for  the  lighting-up 
of  the  Dark  Continent  by  the  torchbearers  of  civilization,  for  the 
carrying  of  the  flag  of  Greater  Britain  from  the  Cape  to  Cairo. 

A  man  of  kindred  spirit,  but  of  far  more  quixotic  temper, 
the  great  soldier,  General  Gordon,  once  told  him  of  the  offer  of 
a  roomful  of  gold  by  the  Chinese  Government  for  his  extraordi- 
nary services  in  subduing  the  Tai-Ping  rebellion. 

"  What  did  you  do  ? "  said  Rhodes. 

"  Refused  it,  of  course,"  said  the  disdainful  Gordon.  "  What 
would  you  have  done  ?  " 

"  Done,"  said  Rhodes,  "  why,  I  would  have  taken  it,  and  as 
many  more  roomfuls  as  the  Chinese  would  give  me.  It  is  no 
use  to  us  to  have  big  ideas,  if  we  have  not  got  the  money  to 
carry  them  out." 

The  range  of  his  plans  and  how  he  pursued  them  will  be 
presented  in  detail  in  the  chapter  dealing  with  the  far-reaching 
undertakings  of  the  great  Chartered  Company  which  he  con- 
ceived and  brought  into  existence.  It  is  sufficient  to  note  at 

D 

present  that  he  pushed  the  development  of  his  grand  political 
aims  apace  with  the  means  at  his  command,  from  the  very  begin- 
ning of  his  appearance  as  a  prominent  factor  in  the  development 
of  the  diamond  mines.  He  entered  the  Cape  Parliament  as 
a  member  for  the  district  of  Barkly  West,  almost  coincidently 
with  the  formation  of  the  De  Beers  Mining  Company.  From 
the  day  of  his  entrance  into  the  political  field,  he  worked  un- 
waveringly for  the  extension  of  British  dominion  into  the  heart 
of  Africa. 


284      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


THE    MOVING   MEN 


285 


The  northern  boundary  of  the  province  of  Griqualand  West, 
formed  by  the  inclusion  of  the  new  Diamond  Fields,  had  not 
been  determined  by  careful  surveying,  and  the  location  of  the 
line  was  disputed  by  the  Batlapin  chief,  Mankoroane,  who 
claimed  control  of  the  territory  which  is  now  Lower  Bechuana- 
land.  Rhodes  prevailed  on  the  Cape  Government  to  form 
and  send  out  a  Delimitation  Commission  for  the  settlement  of 


Avenue  of  Oaks,  Cape  Town.     House  of  Parliament  at  the  Left. 

the  dispute,  and  his  appointment  as  one  of  the  commissioners 
was  a  natural  recognition  of  his  interest  and  competence. 
Shortly  after  he  reached  the  frontier  he  was  able  to  satisfy 
himself  that  the  complaint  of  the  chief  was  well  founded.  Some 
seventy  farms  belonging  to  Mankoroane's  tribe  had  been  in- 
cluded in  error  within  the  bounds  of  the  British  province,  and 
justice  demanded  this  acknowledgment.  But  instead  of  aban- 
doning the  ground,  Rhodes  saw  that  restitution  might  be 
made  in  a  way  to  accord  with  his  aim  for  the  extension  of 


286      THE   DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH   AFRICA 

British  sovereignty,  and  his  cogent  appeal  persuaded  the 
Batlapin  chief  to  place  all  his  territorial  holdings,  covering  half 
Bechuanaland,  under  British  protection  by  cession  to  the  Cape 
Colony.  To  his  mortification,  however,  the  Colony  declined 
the  offered  cession  with  its  contingent  obligations.  Then 
Rhodes  appealed  to  the  Home  Government,  and  finally  suc- 
ceeded in  obtaining  the  establishment  of  a  Protectorate  over 
Lower  Bechuanaland  in  1884. 

But  it  was  only  by  the  most  pressing  insistence  that  this 
advance  was  maintained.  The  Cape  Colony  was  so  stubborn  in 
its  refusal  to  bear  the  expense  of  any  new  acquisition,  and  the 
Imperial  Government  was  so  doubtful  and  sluggish  in  grasping 
its  opportunities,  that  Rhodes  was  forced  to  the  conclusion  that 
the  only  assurance  of  the  accomplishment  of  his  aims  must 
come  from  his  own  private  enterprise,  —  through  the  forming  of 
some  great  corporation,  whose  capital  and  interests  might  be 
engaged  in  his  undertaking  for  the  control  and  development  of 
the  resources  of  the  vast  barbaric  interior  of  Africa.  It  was 
for  this  cause  chiefly  that  he  was  so  unflaggingly  insistent  upon 
the  farthest  possible  stretch  of  amalgamation  in  the  control  of 
the  diamond  mines,  though  it  must  justly  be  observed  that  the 
thorough  amalgamation  of  conflicting  interests  in  the  Fields  was 

O  D  O 

very  highly  desirable,  if  not  absolutely  essential,  for  its  systematic 
development  and  the  marketing  of  its  output.  A  possible  com- 
bination, with  which  Barnato  would  have  rested  content,  would 
have  wholly  failed  to  accomplish  the  end  which  Rhodes  had  so 
deeply  at  heart. 

In  the  year  1887,  shortly  after  taking  charge  of  the  De 
Beers  Mining  Company,  Mr.  Rhodes  requested  me  to  write  to 
two  of  my  friends  in  London,  Mr.  Hamilton  Smith  and  Mr. 
E.  G.  De  Crano,  who  founded  the  Exploration  Company  of 
London,  and  who  were  intimately  connected  with  the  Messrs. 
Rothschild,  and  request  them  to  ask  Lord  Rothschild  if  he 
would  supply  the  funds  for  the  purchase  of  the  French  Com- 
pany in  the  Kimberley  mine,  provided  Rhodes  could  come 
to  some  agreement  with  that  Company  for  the  purchase  of  the 


THE    MOVING    MEN 


287 


property.  Before  any  answer  could  be  received,  even  by  cable, 
Rhodes,  who  had  gone  from  Kimberley  to  Cape  Town  to 
attend  the  Session  of  Parliament,  became  very  impatient  about 
securing  this  property,  and  wired  me  to  join  him,  and  we  sailed 
from  Cape  Town  on  the  6th  of  July.  In  my  letter  to  Messrs. 
Smith  and  De  Crano  I  put  before  them  the  plan  which  Rhodes 
proposed  to  carry  out,  and  the  object  he  had  in  purchasing  the 
French  Company's  property,  viz.,  to  prevent  the  amalgamation 
of  all  the  interests  in  that  mine,  which  might  be  set  up  as  an 
independent  company  in  conflict 
with  the  interests  of  De  Beers. 

On  our  arrival  in  London  we 
met  Lord  Rothschild,  and  Rhodes 
discussed  the  plan  with  him.  In 
the  meantime,  while  we  were  on 
the  water,  Rhodes's  scheme  had 
been  presented  to  the  late  Mr. 
Tite  and  to  Mr.  Carl  Meyer  of 
Messrs.  N.  M.  Rothschild  & 
Sons,  who  were  very  favorably  im- 
pressed with  the  business,  and  had 
discussed  it  with  Lord  Rothschild. 
Mr.  De  Crano  had  made  several 
trips  to  Paris,  and  had  already  Mr.  Carl  Meyer, 

paved  the  way  for  a  conference  between  Rhodes  and  the  directors 
of  the  "  French  Company." 

At  the  close  of  the  interview,  Lord  Rothschild  said,  "  Well, 
Mr.  Rhodes,  you  go  to  Paris  and  see  what  you  can  do  in  refer- 
ence to  the  purchase  of  the  French  Company's  property,  and  in 
the  meantime  I  will  see  if  I  can  raise  the  ^1,000,000  which  you 
desire." 

On  leaving  the  room  Lord  Rothschild  stopped  Mr.  De 
Crano  for  a  moment,  and  said  to  him,  "You  may  tell  Mr. 
Rhodes  that  if  he  can  buy  the  French  Company,  I  think  I  can 
raise  the  million  pounds  sterling." 

The    same    evening   Rhodes,    Mr.   De   Crano,    Mr.    Harry 


288      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

Mosenthal,  and  myself  left  for  Paris,  and  after  several  meetings 
with  the  French  Company's  directors,  we  settled  upon  the  terms 
for  the  purchase  of  their  property,  which  they  valued  at  that  time 
at  about  ^  1,400,000,  including  all  their  assets.  On  returning 
to  London  Mr.  Rhodes  arranged  with  Lord  Rothschild  that  he 
should  furnish  him  with  ^750,000,  which  would  be  sufficient  for 
the  time  being  to  complete  the  arrangements  that  he  had  made 
with  the  French  Company.  In  my  letter  of  the  i8th  of  June, 
it  was  mentioned  to  Messrs.  Smith  and  De  Crano  that  Rhodes 
would  be  willing  to  issue  De  Beers  shares  in  payment  of  the 
loan  at  £i  less  than  the  ruling  market  price  of  the  shares  at  the 
date  the  money  was  paid,  and  would  pay  Messrs.  Rothschild  a 
handsome  commission  for  transacting  the  business. 

The  final  arrangement  made  for  the  payment  of  this  money 
was  the  issue  of  50,000  De  Beers  Mining  Company's  shares  at 
J~i$  per  share,  and  a  syndicate  was  formed  to  take  up  these 
shares  with  the  able  assistance  of  Mr.  Ludwig  Lippert,  of  Ham- 
burg. It  was  agreed  between  Lord  Rothschild  and  Rhodes 
that  the  profit  on  the  rise  of  the  shares  between  ^16  and  J~zo 
during  the  next  three  months  should  be  divided  between  the 
purchasing  syndicate  and  the  De  Beers  Company.  The  shares 
rapidly  rose,  and,  before  the  expiration  of  the  time,  had  already 
reached  ^22  per  share.  The  De  Beers  Company  received 
;£ 1 00,000  as  their  portion  of  the  profit  on  the  rise  of  the  shares. 
Shortly  after  the  completion  of  this  business  Rhodes  returned 
to  the  colony  and  awaited  the  result  of  the  French  Company's 
shareholders'  meeting  to  confirm  the  sale  which  had  been  made 
to  him  by  the  directors  of  that  company.  Barnato  and  others 
interested  in  the  Kimberley  Central  Company,  upon  hearing  of 
the  transaction  that  had  taken  place,  determined  to  use  every 
effort  to  prevent  the  consummation  of  this  sale,  and  threatened 
to  offer  the  shareholders  of  the  French  Company  at  their  gen- 
eral meeting  ^300,000  more  than  the  amount  for  which  the 
directors  had  pledged  the  company  to  Rhodes. 

As  a  general  of  a  great  army  is  obliged  to  have  the  assistance 
and  cooperation  of  competent  lieutenants  to  carry  out  the  plan 


THE   MOVING   MEN 


289 


of  campaign  which  his  superior  mind  has  conceived,  so  Rhodes 
looked  about  for  the  strongest  and  ablest  men  to  join  him  in 
repelling  the  vigorous  attack  which  was  being  made  against  him. 
The  first  check  which  he  gave  his  opponents  seemed  at  first  sight 
to  be  a  complete  surrender  to  them.  Instead  of  allowing  Bar- 
nato  and  his  colleagues  to  bid  against  him  for  the  purchase  of 
the  French  Company,  Rhodes  arranged  with  them  that  he  should 
complete  the  purchase  upon  the  lines  agreed  upon  with  the  direc- 
tors of  that  company,  and  promised  to  unite  the  interests  so  pur- 
chased with  the  Kimberley  Central  Company,  in  which  Mr.  Francis 
Baring-Gould,  who  was  the  chair- 
man, Barnato,  and  others  held  the 
controlling  power,  taking  shares  in 
the  Central  Company  in  payment. 

In  this,  as  well  as  in  subsequent 
transactions,  Rhodes  was  most  ably 
assisted  by  Mr.  Alfred  Beit,  the 
Kimberley  representative  of  Jules 
Forges  &  Co.,  who  started  business 
in  Paris  as  diamond  merchants  in 
1869.  The  men  who  from  time  to 
time  have  been  connected  with  Mr. 
Forges  and  the  successors  to  him, 
Messrs.  Wernher,  Beit  &  Co.,  took 
the  keenest  interest  in  Rhodes's  scheme,  and  assisted  him  more 
than  all  others  in  bringing  about  the  consolidation  of  the  dia- 
mond interests.  As  early  as  1871  Mr.  Julius  Wernher  went 
out  to  Kimberley  in  the  capacity  of  diamond  buyer  for  Jules 
Forges  &  Co.,  and  became  partner  in  the  firm  in  1878.  The 
firm  grew  in  importance,  and  became  owners  in  some  of  the 
largest  companies  in  the  four  mines.  They  were  the  founders 
of  the  Griqualand  West  Diamond  Mining  Company  in  Kim- 
berley mine,  which  was  afterward  re-formed  into  the  "  French 
Company."  Mr.  Alfred  Beit  came  to  the  fields  in  1875  as  a 
diamond  buyer  for  the  firm  of  Lippert  &  Co.,  of  Hamburg,  and 
after  a  few  years  established  himself  in  business  as  a  diamond 


Mr.  Alfred  Beit,  while  a  Resident  of 
Kimberley. 


290       THE    DIAMOND    MINES   OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

buyer  on  his  own  account.  In  the  year  1882  he  joined  the  firm 
of  Jules  Forges  &  Co.,  as  their  representative  in  South  Africa, 
and  became  a  partner  in  the  firm  in  1886. 

In  1889  Mr.  Forges  retired  from  the  firm,  which  was  re- 
formed as  Wernher,  Beit  &  Co.,  Mr.  Max  Michaelis  joining 
the  firm.  Mr.  Michaelis  came  to  the  Fields  in  1878,  and  went 
into  partnership  with  Mr.  S.  Neumann.  He  organized  the  Cape 
Diamond  Mining  Company  in  Kimberley  mine.  In  1880  he 
entered  into  an  arrangement  with  Jules  Forges  &  Co.  to  carry  on 
his  diamond  business  on  joint  account  with  them,  which  arrange- 
ment remained  in  force  until  Mr.  Forges  retired,  when  he  became 
a  partner  in  the  new  firm.  Mr.  Michaelis  assisted  in  bringing 
about  the  fusion  of  several  of  the  large  claim-holders  in  the 
Kimberley  mine,  such  as  Baring-Gould  &  Atkins,  and  Baring- 
Gould,  Price  &  Tracy,  with  the  Kimberley  Central  Company. 

The  great  initiative  and  business  capabilities  of  Mr.  Beit 
were  heartily  recognized  by  Rhodes,  and  he  was  very  largely 
instrumental  in  building  up  the  diamond-mining  industries,  and 
bringing  the  dreams  of  Rhodes  into  practical  shape  and  on 
business  lines. 

At  a  special  general  meeting  of  the  shareholders  of  the  De 
Beers  Mining  Company  Limited,  held  at  Kimberley  on  the  3ist 

and  con- 
respective 


of  March,    1888,  for  the  purpose  of  considering 
firming    an    agreement    entered    into    between    the 


The  Diamond  Market,  Kimberley,  1875.     (First  Office  of  Mr.  Alfred  Beit  at  the  Left.) 


THE   MOVING   MEN  291 

Boards  for  the  amalgamation  of  the  De  Beers  Mining  Company 
with  De  Beers  Consolidated  Mines  Limited,  Mr.  Rhodes  gave 
his  reasons  for  the  necessity  of  acquiring  either  the  control  of  the 
Kimberley  mine  or  of  entering  into  some  arrangement  with  the 
directors  of  the  Central  Company,  who  controlled  the  mine,  by 
which  the  output  of  both  De  Beers  and  Kimberley  mines  could 
be  regulated.  He  saw  that  by  skilful  and  systematic  mining 
on  the  underground  system,  the  output  of  the  mines  could  be 
increased  far  beyond  the  world's  requirements.  It  was  clear, 
too,  if  these  two  mines  were  run  in  opposition  to  one  another, 
it  would  result  in  the  flooding  of  the  market  with  diamonds,  and 
a  consequent  depreciation  of  their  value,  with  a  fall  in  market 
prices  almost  ruinous  to  both  companies.  He  saw  that  the  out- 
put of  diamond-bearing  ground  could  be  made  almost  unlimited, 
and  in  referring  to  this  he  said:  "We  had  to  face  either  an  arrange- 
ment with  the  Kimberley  Central  Company,  vor  obtain  control 
of  the  Kimberley  mine.  We  approached  the  Kimberley  mine 
management  in  every  possible  way  we  could  conceive.  I  valued 
the  De  Beers  mine  higher  than  they  did,  but  I  was  willing  to 
give  way  in  order  to  obtain  control.  I  was  met  simply  with 
smiles  and  obdurate  statements.  I  was  met  with  the  arguments 
of  the  gentleman  at  '  the  corner,'  who  said  the  Kimberley  mine 
was  worth  three  times  as  much  as  De  Beers.  We  had  to  choose 
between  the  ruin  of  the  diamond  industry  or  the  control  of  the 
Kimberley  mine.  We  saw  this,  that  you  could  never  deal  with 
obstinate  people  until  you  got  the  whip  hand  of  them,  and  that 
the  only  thing  we  had  to  do  to  secure  the  success  of  our  industry 
was  to  get  the  control  of  the  Kimberley  mine." 

As  soon  as  Rhodes  had  bought  the  French  Company  and 
amalgamated  his  interests  with  the  Kimberley  Central  Company, 
he  found  that  the  management  of  that  Company  was  headstrong 
in  its  determination  to  run  the  Kimberley  mine  in  rivalry  with 
De  Beers.  This  was  diametrically  opposed  to  his  conviction 
that  monopoly  was  the  essence  of  success  in  diamond  mining ; 
for,  as  he  said,  "  Our  engineers  had  long  ago  shown  us  that,  by 
underground  working,  Kimberley  and  De  Beers  mines  could 


292      THE   DIAMOND    MINES   OF   SOUTH   AFRICA 


THE   MOVING   MEN  293 

produce  far  more  diamonds  than  the  world  would  take."  By 
the  purchase  of  the  French  Company,  De  Beers  Company  held 
one-fifth  of  the  capital  of  the  Central  Company,  and  after  many 
attempts  to  bring  about  a  friendly  union  of  the  two  mines, 
Rhodes  came  to  the  conclusion  that  the  only  feasible  plan 
was  to  buy  a  sufficient  number  of  shares  in  the  Central  Company 
to  obtain  control.  To  accomplish  this  would  take  at  least 
^2,000,000  sterling.  Fortunately  Mr.  Alfred  Beit,  whose  com- 
mand of  capital  for  such  great  undertakings  was  unequalled  in 
South  Africa,  stood  fast  by  him  in  determined  cooperation.  In 
answer  to  Rhodes's  natural  question,  "  Where  is  the  money  to 
come  from  ?  "  Mr.  Beit  said  pithily,  "  We  will  get  the  money 
if  we  can  only  get  the  shares." 

Then  ensued  a  most  keen  contest.  Mr.  Beit  and  Rhodes  be- 
gan buying  all  Central  shares  that  could  be  secured  with  apparently 
limitless  means.  Both  were  leaders  in  the  contest,  but  Mr.  Beit 
furnished  most  of  the  money.  Meanwhile  Barney  Barnato  was 
bidding  against  them  with  unfailing  pluck  for  the  control  of  the 
Company.  The  price  of  shares  mounted  by  jumps,  but  never 
too  high  for  Barnato,  who  was  persistent  in  his  claim  that  the 
Kimberley  mine  was  worth  two  of  De  Beers.  Rhodes's  version 
of  the  story  of  this  struggle  is  that  in  his  purchase  of  shares  he 
had  the  support  of  the  loyal  directors  and  shareholders  of  his 
Company,  while  his  principal  opponent  was  handicapped  by  the 
fact  that  he  was  forced  to  buy  out  his  own  largest  shareholders. 
There  is  little  doubt  that  Barnato  felt  this  apparent  lack  of  loy- 
alty keenly,  but  he  was  too  strenuous  a  fighter  to  concede  defeat. 
As  a  matter  of  fact,  he  came  to  terms  with  his  antagonists  only 
when  the  price  of  shares  had  been  bulled  to  a  figure  that  seemed 
out  of  reason  even  to  his  sanguine  estimate,  while  the  price  of 
diamonds  had  been  forced  down  unprofitably  by  unobstructed 
competition.  After  many  and  long  conferences,  Rhodes  made 
Barnato  one  last  offer,  which  he  accepted.  For  his  interest  in 
the  Kimberley  Central  Company  he  was  paid  with  De  Beers 
shares  at  the  current  rates  of  shares  on  the  day  of  the  sale.  By 
this  purchase  De  Beers'  holding  of  Central  shares  was  brought 


294      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

up  to  eleven  thousand  out  of  seventeen  thousand  shares.  Under 
the  trust  deed  of  the  Central  no  amalgamation  could  be  made 
unless  half  the  capital  was  present  at  a  meeting  called  for  the 
purpose,  and  no  new  resolution  could  be  carried  without  a  two- 
thirds  majority  of  those  present.  The  bargain  with,  Barnato 
gave  De  Beers  the  control. 

So  having  finally  obtained  the  control  of  the  Kimberley  mine 
by  purchase  for  ^5,338, 650,  Rhodes  turned  his  attention  to 
what  he  called  the  poorer  mines,  Dutoitspan  and  Bultfontein. 
At  a  meeting  of  De  Beers  shareholders  he  said  he  was  reminded 
of  a  story  he  had  read  about  a  certain  mine,  of  which  it  was  said 
"it  was  too  rich  to  leave  and  too  poor  to  pay,"  and  he  would 
thus  describe  the  mines  alluded  to.  "  Nothing,"  he  said,  "  was 
so  extraordinary  as  the  way  in  which  the  people  would  hold  scrip 
from  year  to  year  that  never  pays,  but  it  was  always  said,  *  Oh, 
next  year  it  will  pay,'  and  so  it  went  on  from  year  to  year."  He 
wished  to  state  "  that  so  far  as  the  amalgamation  of  the  diamond 
mines  was  concerned,  it  would  not  help  the  poorer  mines,  but 
rather  the  other  way.  It  was  generally  noticed  in  mining 
matters  that  following  upon  one  success  a  number  of  unsuccess- 
ful ventures  were  floated.  And  this  was  why  they  had  secured 
these  interests  in  Dutoitspan  and  Bultfontein  mines."  He  did 
not  look  upon  the  purchase  of  properties  in  these  mines  as  a 
good  investment,  with  diamonds  at  the  price  they  were  bringing 
at  the  time  of  the  purchase;  but  as  these  two  mines  were  large 
factors  in  the  production  of  diamonds,  their  yield,  even  if  mined 
at  a  loss,  would  affect  in  a  very  large  degree  the  price  which 
could  be  obtained  for  the  product  of  the  richer  mines. 
Although  Dutoitspan  mine  could  not  be  worked  at  a  profit  at 
the  market  price  of  diamonds,  and  the  mine  had  already  begun 
to  be  troubled  with  reef  falls  burying  the  blue  ground  below, 
still  he  considered  it  necessary  to  get  control  of  the  principal 
companies  in  this  mine.  In  Bultfontein  mine,  where  the  reef 
troubles  had  already  begun,  there  was  still  a  large  portion  of  the 
mine  in  process  of  working,  and  he  described  it  as  being  "  on 
the  margin  of  cultivation."  If  the  reef  remained  standing,  and 


THE    MOVING    MEN 


295 


:^:*:*-." 


296      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

the  price  of  diamonds  was  fair,  the  mine  could  be  worked  at  a 
small  profit. 

Rhodes  continued  the  purchase  of  the  properties  in  both 
these  mines  until  the  whole  of  the  two  mines  came  into  the 
possession  of  the  corporation  organized  as  De  Beers  Consoli- 
dated Mines.  He  showed  the  shareholders  in  the  various 
companies  that  the  fate  of  the  poorer  mines  lay  in  his  hands, 
because  he  could  produce  twice  the  amount  of  diamonds  the 
world  required  from  De  Beers  and  Kimberley  mines  alone. 
Even  at  the  low  rate  of  fourteen  shillings  a  carat,  he  made  it 
clear  that  the  richer  mines  could  pay  to  the  shareholders  divi- 
dends which  would  satisfy  them.  "  The  poorer  mines,  '  on  the 
margin  of  cultivation,'  would  have  to  accept  our  offers,  or  fight 
us  on  two  grounds,  larger  output  and  lower  rates." 

In  his  speech  at  the  annual  meeting  of  the  De  Beers  Min- 
ing Company,  held  at  Kimberley  on  the  I2th  day  of  May,  1888, 
Rhodes  bore  tribute  cordially  to  the  essential  cooperation  of 
Mr.  Beit  in  his  great  undertaking. 

In  moving  a  vote  of  thanks  to  the  chairman,  his  former 
antagonist,  Barnato,  briefly  referred  to  the  struggle  which  was 
closed  by  the  purchase  of  his  shares  in  the  Kimberley  mine. 
He  said  "  no  person  knew  better  than  he  did  the  labor  Mr. 
Rhodes  had  to  convert  him  into  the  De  Beers  Mining  Company." 
He  could  say  that  day  after  day  and  night  after  night  Mr. 
Rhodes  was  laboring  to  get  him  to  take  De  Beers  for  Centrals. 
He  gave  way  when  he  saw  diamonds  down  to  eighteen  shillings 
a  carat,  and  on  those  conditions  he  joined  Mr.  Rhodes.  It  is 
only  just  to  Barnato  to  note  in  closing  that  he  was  as  loyal  in 
his  later  cooperation  as  he  had  been  persistent  in  his  antagonism. 
It  is  sad  to  recall  how  his  brilliant  and  versatile  mind  gave  way 
under  the  enormous  strain  brought  upon  him  by  the  various 
obligations  incurred  through  his  numerous  investments  and 
flotations  in  the  gold  fields.  His  tragic  death  was  a  distressful 
close  to  his  phenomenal  career.  On  his  way  to  England  from 
the  Cape,  in  June,  1897,  he  suddenly  sprang  overboard  and  was 
drowned. 


.8881  SI 


DIAMOND    >U\t  ;  •  M    ,\!-RtCA 

diamond*  -'d  b?  worked  at  a 

u    properties  in  both 
;i.!ies   came  into  the 
DC  Beers  Consoli- 

;•  holders    in    the    various 
mines  lay  in  his  hands, 
.mount   of  diamonds  the 
Kimberley  mines   alone. 
: '  i ••'•  i;iigs  a  carat,  he  made  it 

r»>  the  shareholders   divi- 
I  he  poorer  mines,  '  on   the 
?  accept  our  offers,  or  fight 
'•.i  Io\\er  rates." 

•; -rring  of  the    De   Beers   Min- 
'?n  the  1 2th  day  of  May,  1888, 

Barnato's  Turnout  on  the  Occasion  of  his  First  Election- to ;thev  Cape  Pailioi   of 
ment  as  Senior  Member  for  Kimberley,  November  17,  1888. 

-  k>   to   the   chairman,   his  former 

•  *•.  vred   to   the  struggle  which  was 

-hares   in   the    Kimberley  mine. 

icrter   than   he   did   the   labor  Mr. 

!<aci  the  De  Hcers  Mining  Company." 

«!av    and    night   utter   night    Mr. 

»  take   I)c    Beers  for  Centrals. 

•  liamn^is  down  to  eighteen  shillings 

L'i.'i'-d    Mv.    Rhodes.      It  is 

lie  was  as   loyal  in 

-rent  \'\  his  antagonism. 

versariie  mind  gave  way 

upon   him    by  the  various 

minv^us    investments    and 

:   fr.  His  tragic  'leach  was  a  distressful 

O;i   his  wav   to    1' '.upland  from 

:ji.'ltnl'    sprang  overboard  and  was 


CHAPTER   X 


THE    ESSENTIAL    COMBINATION 

T  has  been  told  why  and  how  the  conflicting 
interests  on  the  Diamond  Field  were  fused  in 
one  dominant  organization.  The  signal  ser- 
vices of  this  amalgamation  are  now  too  obvious 
for  dispute.  By.  the  formation  of  De  Beers 
Consolidated  Mines  Limited,  it  became  practi- 
cable to  design  and  conduct  mining  operations  systematically 
and  economically  and  to  regulate  the  output  to  the  market  de- 
mand. It  was  soon  apparent,  too,  that  the  organization  of  this 
extraordinary  joint  stock  company  was  the  creation  of  a  power 
of  yet  unmeasured  service  for  the  development  of  the  resources 
of  South  Africa  and  the  push  of  civilization  through  the  Dark 
Continent. 

The  only  approaches  to  the  far-reaching  conception  of  this 
organization  must  be  traced  back  to  the  old  Dutch  and  English 
East  India  companies,  or  the  visionary  project  of  John  Law, 
exploding  in  air  as  the  Mississippi  Bubble.  At  the  outset,  on 
the  1 2th  of  March,  1888,  a  seemingly  unpretentious  joint  stock 
company  was  formed  and  established  at  Kimberley  with  a  capital 
of  £ 1 00,000  sterling,  divided  into  twenty  thousand  shares  of 
^"5  each.  Authority  was  granted,  however,  in  the  articles  of  the 
association,  to  the  shareholders  of  the  company  to  increase  this 
small  capital  in  general  meeting,  from  time  to  time,  for  the 
acquisition  of  new  property,  by  creating  new  shares  to  any 
extent,  or,  in  the  exact  words  of  article  39,  "  such  amount  as 
may  be  deemed  expedient."  No  provision  for  expansion  and 
acquisition  could  be  more  liberal,  and  the  particular  specifica- 
tions of  the  articles  of  the  association  show  that  "  new  property," 

297 


298      THE    DIAMOND    MINES   OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

in  possible  range  at  least,  was  not  confinable  to  the  Diamond 
Fields  or  Cape  Colony,  or  even,  perhaps,  the  scope  of  the  whole 
Dark  Continent. 

It  was  remarked  somewhat  caustically  at  the  time,  but  with 
undeniable  keenness,  that  it  was  much  easier  to  tell  what  this 
amazing  Company  could  do  than  to  determine  what  it  should 
not  do  under  its  articles  of  association  and  trust  deed  incorpo- 
ration under  the  limited  liability  laws  of  the  Cape  of  Good 
Hope.  It  might  shift  its  head  office  from  Kimberley  to  any 
other  place  on  earth.  It  might  "  acquire  by  purchase,  amalga- 
mation, grant,  concession,  lease,  license,  barter,  or  otherwise  any 
houses,  lands,  farms,  tracts  of  country,  quarries,  mines,  mining 
or  other  claims,  rights  and  privileges,  water  rights,  waterworks 
or  other  works,  privileges,  rights  and  hereditaments,  diamonds 
and  other  precious  stones,  gold  and  other  minerals,  ores,  coals, 
earth,  and  any  other  valuable  product  or  substance,  machinery, 
plant,  utensils,  trade  marks,  patents  for  invention,  licenses  to 
use  any  patented  invention,  and  other  movable  and  immovable 
property  of  any  description  in  Africa  or  elsewhere."  Under 
this  liberal  license,  the  only  apparent  obstacle  to  its  ownership 
of  the  face  of  the  earth  is  the  declination  of  other  holders  to  sell 
or  give  it  away. 

It  was  further  specifically  authorized  to  carry  on  a  mining  and 
general  trading  business  in  any  part  of  the  globe,  and  to  con- 
struct, maintain,  and  operate  any  tramways,  railways,  roads,  tun- 
nels, waterworks,  canals,  gas  works,  electric  works,  reservoirs, 
water-courses,  furnaces,  stamping  works,  smelting  works,  fac- 
tories, and  in  general,  "any  other  works  and  conveniences  which 
the  Company  may  think  conducive  to  any  of  its  objects."  It 
might  also  become  interested  in,  promote,  and  undertake  the 
formation  and  establishment  of  such  institutions  or  companies 
(trading,  manufacturing,  banking,  or  other)  as  may  be  considered 
to  be  conducive  to  the  profit  and  interest  of  the  Company,  and 
to  carry  on  any  business,  in  short,  "  calculated  directly  or  indi- 
rectly to  render  any  of  the  Company's  properties  or  rights  for 
the  time  being  profitable."  There  was  also  provision  for  the 


O  A 


!  HK    DIAMOND    MINF>.    <>F  JH    AFRICA 

ssible  range  at   !  «.•.<•;'  -it*  ruble   to  the   Diamond 

t  nis  or  Cape  (<>'  •-,  the  scope  of  the  whole 

i  -ark  Continrnr. 

It  was  !•'.-•  •  ..ally  at  the  time,  but  with 

undeniable  -^h  easier  to  tell  what  this 

Aiiui/ini2  ».  r°  determine  what  it  should 

not  du  viution  and  trust  deed  incorpo- 

ratioi  ;T>    laws    of   the   Cape   of  Good 

Hopt-  -i  office  from   Kimberley  to  any 

"  acquire  by   purchase,  amalga- 

,  license,  barter,  or  otherwise  any 

.»f  country,  quarries,  mines,  mining 

<>rivi  leges,  water  rights,  waterworks 
A  Group  of  De  Beers  Directors  and  Officials  and  Prominent  South  Africans 

who  attended  the  Annual  Meeting;  October  24,  1894^ 

•'•'• 


From  Left  torft}g$fc,Cf  ,tance,  machinery, 

Dr.  R.  Harris,  Richard  Solomon,  ,. 

W.  H.  Craven,  s  l5?J.  Ws&frB&P11' 

G.  W.  Compton.  ieD*PL.-S.  Jam'es^n,immovable 

Major  Goold  Adams,  in   AfriGccil  j.  Rhodesere."      Under 

Gardner  F.  Williams,  apparentHfoN^P11'         *  ownership 

Judge  J.  G.  Lange.  Henry  Robinow, 

*  ^  i      i  LJ  the  declinatu.)  •   \..   ,        holders  to  sell 

Lieutenant  Colonel  Harris.  C.  E.  Nmd. 

My  authorized  to  carry  on  a  mining  and 

•i   any  part  of  the  globe,  and  to  con- 

;-.ite  any  tramways,  railways,  roads,  tun- 

,r;is  works,  electric   works,  reservoirs, 

imping   works,    smelting   works,  fac- 

other  works  and  conveniences  which 

onducive  to   anv  ot   its  objects."      It 

•-,ied    in,   promote,   and  undertake  the 

of  such   institutions  or  companies 

ri,i:n;;.  :ng,or  other!  as  may  be  considered 

IK   ojndiu:  •«  r     and   interest  of  the  Company,  and 

;  carry  on   arv  busin-.r  imrt,  "calculated  directly  or  indi- 

•    nd-jr  ativ  nf  f  i-'iipany's  properties  or  rights  for 

u-  p^-ofitab'.t  i  here   was  also   provision  for  the 


OF  \ 

UNIVERSITY 


THE   ESSENTIAL    COMBINATION  299 

possible  acquirement  of  any  tract  or  tracts  of  country  of  any  size 
in  Africa  or  elsewhere,  together  with  any  rights  that  might  be 
granted  by  the  rulers  or  owners  thereof,  and  the  expenditure  of 
any  sums  deemed  requisite  and  advisable  in  the  development 
and  maintenance  of  order  and  good  government  in  such  acquisi- 
tions. 

In  view  of  the  enjoyment  by  the  shareholders  of  such  privi- 
leges and  liberties,  it  was  only  natural  that  the  directors  of  the 
Company  should  not  be  grudgingly  confined.  This  was,  indeed, 
the  case,  and  two  specifications  of  powers,  in  particular,  have 
proved  to  be  highly  serviceable  in  practice,  for  there  has  been 
no  abuse  of  discretion.  The  directors  were  authorized  "  to  pur- 
chase, hire,  or  otherwise  acquire  for  the  Company  any  share  in 
any  kind  of  joint  stock  company,  property  rights,  or  privileges 
which  the  Company  is  authorized  to  acquire,  at  such  price  and 
generally  on  such  terms  and  conditions  as  they  may  think  fit ; 
also  to  sell,  lease,  abandon,  or  otherwise  deal  with  any  shares, 
property  rights,  or  privileges  to  which  the  Company  may  be 
entitled,  on  such  terms  and  conditions  as  they  may  see  fit,  and  to 
amalgamate  with  any  other  company  or  companies  having  objects 
altogether  or  in  part  similar  to  the  objects  of  this  Company." 
They  were  further  empowered  "  to  found,  promote,  float,  and 
acquire  interest  or  shares  in  any  companies,  undertakings,  or  in- 
stitutions, as  they  may  deem  advisable  in  the  interests  of  the 
Company  ;  also  to  acquire  interests  in,  promote,  aid,  or  subsidize 
any  useful  industry  or  undertaking  in  any  country  where  the 
Company  may  be  carrying  on  business." 

At  the  outset,  De  Beers  Consolidated  Mines  Limited  was 
preeminently  what  is  termed  a  close  corporation.  Four  men 
held  all  but  twenty-five  shares  of  its  stock.  These,  in  the  order 
of  their  subscription  to  the  articles  of  association,  were  Alfred 
Beit,  holding  4439  shares  ;  Barnett  I.  Barnato,  holding  6658  ; 
Cecil  J.  Rhodes,  holding  4439  ;  and  Frederick  S.  P.  Stow,  hold- 
ing the  same  number  as  Beit  and  Rhodes.  These  four,  by  the 
articles,  were  practically  authorized  as  shareholders  to  create  "  five 
life  governors  or  permanent  directors  of  the  Company,  four 


300      THE   DIAMOND   MINES   OF   SOUTH   AFRICA 

of  whom  shall  be  Cecil  John  Rhodes,  Barnett  Isaac  Barnato, 
Frederick  Samuel  Philipson  Stow,  and  Alfred  Beit."  If  "  so 
minded,"  these  four  had  the  power  by  unanimous  resolution  of 
themselves  or  their  survivors  to  appoint  the  fifth  authorized 
"  life  governor,"  and  to  fill  any  vacancy  occurring  in  their 
number  by  reason  of  death  or  otherwise.  These  four  were 
further  constituted  the  first  directors  of  the  Company,  and  had 


power  to  appoint  other  directors,  if  they  so  desired,  to  act  in 
conjunction  with  them  until  the  first  ordinary  general  meeting 
of  the  Company,  when  the  shareholders  were  called  upon  to  de- 
termine how  many  directors  there  should  be  besides  the  life 
governors,  and  to  elect  "  such  number  as  they  determine  to  be 
necessary." 

From  the  point  of  view  of  ordinary  investors  in  ordinary 
stock  companies  the  unlimited  sweep  of  this  unique  organization 
and  the  powers  confided  to  its  controlling  directors  may  be 


TH;  301 

summed  up  in  on.     1 

are  indeed  "  of  this 

combinar 

tion  thar 

and  \ 

but 

atio; 

ing  a; 

freedom  of  exj 

possibl 

great,  but  who  vn  grw 

for  the  reconciliu 

rational  developme 

fort  of  the  miners,  the  profit  u 

of  allied  industries,  Wt>E  BEERS  GROUP. 

The  possih'  &*»<%£  of  ex t  Sitting. 

From  Left  to  Right. 

Thomas  Shiels,  J.  Morrogh, 

harmlessn<6.  W.  Compton,       'd  vil          to  tl   H.  Mosenthal, 
might  "  gi?-t R-  English.  .  powdF.  S.  P.  Stow, 

there  t  C-  E-  Atkinson. 

corporate   ; 

il    corp< 

rap  iil  was  \ 

man  of  Rhodes, 

the  special  gene/al  meet;  he  sharc: 

Mining  Company.     The  programme 
mously  endorsed  by  the  shareholdt 
it  without  alteration  as  the  best 
solidation  of  the  diamond-mini) 
At  this  general  meeting  <  ' 
Mining  Company  was  form. 
The  shareholders  of  the 
£$  shares  in  I ' 
fully  paid  £\o  share 


DIAMO.si)    MINKS    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


«'    \iiom  shall   be  "Rhodes,  Harriett   Isaac    Barnato, 

•xdu-ick    S.i<nut!    J"  Stow,   and    Alfred;    Beit."      If  "so 

••.uncicJ,"  thc:>.-  to-.n  ;.  power  1       unanimous  resolution  of 

-,-.»:  "ivors  to  aj^})oint.    the    fifth    authorized 
ID    lil!    any    vacancy    occurring    in    their 
•  •!    Je.itii    or    otherwise.      These    four   were 
:   fir.^r  directors  ot  the  Company,  and  had 


.  :, 

s  .2  ,-q 


c\  sd  desired,  to  act  in 
r,i;-iai  .  general  meeting 
wet  •  called  upon  to  de- 
HiKi  ht:  besides  the  life 
as  the  v  determine  to  be 


<'•{  ordinary    investors   in  ordinary 

•j  iii;i;!ii,''.vi  s\v<-  p  of  this  unique  organization 

confided   to   ^s   controlling    directors    may  be 


THE   ESSENTIAL    COMBINATION  301 

summed  up  in  the  familiar  outcry  of  Dominie  Sampson.  They 
are  indeed  "  prodigious,"  but  the  phenomenal  success  of  this 
combination  is  a  stubborn  fact  that  must  be  faced  in  any  conten- 
tion that  its  scope  and  method  of  conduct  were  unwarrantable 
and  unadvisable.  Its  base  of  operation  was  not  Lombard  Street, 
but  the  heart  of  South  Africa,  in  a  field  so  unique,  in  a  situ- 
ation so  perplexing,  in  unavoidable  touch  with  such  far-rang- 
ing and  conflicting  interests,  that  ordinary  limitations,  hampering 
freedom  of  expansion  and  action,  would  have  been  crippling  and 
possibly  disastrous  handicaps.  The  powers  of  the  directors  are 
great,  but  who  can  justly  deny  that  they  have  been  greatly  used 
for  the  reconciliation  of  jarring  interests,  the  comprehensive  and 
rational  development  of  the  diamond  mines,  the  safety  and  com- 
fort of  the  miners,  the  profit  of  the  shareholders,  the  promotion 
of  allied  industries,  and  the  general  welfare  of  South  Africa  ? 
The  possible  range  of  expansion  of  the  interests  of  the  corpora- 
tion is  a  bugbear  to  some  good  people,  who  would  prefer  the 
harmlessness  of  the  deserted  village  to  the  risk  that  civilization 
might  "  git  forrid  sometimes  upon  a  powder  cart."  But  what  is 
there  to  show,  to-day,  of  the  actual  stretch  and  exercise  of  the 
corporate  powers  beyond  the  judicious  limits  of  profitable  in- 
vestment, sagacious  development  of  tributary  resources,  and  dis- 
charge of  patriotic  obligations  ? 

The  expansion  of  the  original  corporate  foundation  was 
rapidly  pushed.  The  plan  in  detail  was  presented  by  the  chair- 
man of  the  corporation,  Mr.  Rhodes,  on  March  31,  1888,  at 
the  special  general  meeting  of  the  shareholders  of  the  De  Beers 
Mining  Company.  The  programme  thus  presented  was  unani- 
mously endorsed  by  the  shareholders  of  the  Company,  accepting 
it  without  alteration  as  the  best  feasible  proposition  for  the  con- 
solidation of  the  diamond-mining  interests. 

At  this  general  meeting  of  the  shareholders  the  De  Beers 
Mining  Company  was  formally  merged  in  the  new  corporation. 
The  shareholders  of  the  old  Company  received  two  fully  paid 
£$  shares  in  De  Beers  Consolidated  Mines  Limited  for  every 
fully  paid  £10  share  in  the  old  Company.  Having  effected 


302       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

this  acquisition,  transferring  the  whole  of  De  Beers  mine,  and  the 
interests  of  the  late  De  Beers  Mining  Company  in  all  outside 
mining  properties,  the  Consolidated  Mines  pushed  forward  stead- 
ily their  undertaking  of  a  comprehensive  consolidation.  The 
first  and  most  important  step  was  the  securing  of  the  whole  of 
Kimberley  mine,  the  greatest  producing  factor  next  to  De  Beers. 
The  method  by  which  the  property  of  the  Kimberley  Central 
Diamond  Mining  Company  was  finally  turned  over  to  the  Con- 
solidated Mines  has  been  described  in  the  preceding  chapter. 

In  the  acquisition  of  Dutoitspan  and  Bultfontein  mines  a 
different  plan  was  adopted.  These  mines,  at  the  time,  were  not 
profitable  producing  properties,  and  it  was  practically  certain  that 
they  could  not  be  operated  to  advantage  in  view  of  the  output 
from  the  greater  and  richer  mines.  For  several  years  each  of 
these  mines  had  produced  diamonds  to  the  value  of  over  half  a 
million  carats  annually  ;  but  this  production  was  rapidly  declin- 
ing, owing  to  the  unresisted  falls  of  reef.  Among  the  assets 
taken  over  from  the  old  De  Beers  Company  were  a  number  of 
shares  in  the  Griqualand  West  Company  of  Dutoitspan  and 
in  the  Bultfontein  Consolidated  Company.  By  the  influence 
secured  through  this  acquisition,  it  was  not  difficult  to  effect 
permanent  working  agreements  with  De  Beers  Consolidated 
Mines,  by  which  the  new  corporation  attained  complete  posses- 
sion of  both  mining  properties  in  consideration  of  the  payment 
of  a  fixed  annual  dividend.  During  the  second  year  after  the 
incorporation,  the  Consolidated  Mines  purchased  the  property 
of  the  Anglo-African  Mining  Company,  the  Compagnie  Generale 
(including  its  interest  in  the  Conivieras  mines  in  the  Brazils), 
the  Sultan  Diamond  Mining  Company,  and  the  United  Diamond 
Mining  Company,  representing  nearly  all  the  properties  of  ma- 
terial consequence  and  extent  in  Dutoitspan  mine  except  the 
Gordon  Company's  holdings.  During  the  same  period  the 
Consolidated  Mines  bought  in  the  Bultfontein  Mining  Com- 
pany, the  Spes  Bona  Diamond  Mining  Company,  and  the  South 
African  Diamond  Mining  Company,  comprising  a  considerable 
part  of  the  properties  in  the  Bultfontein  mine. 


THE    !•> 


\TION 


THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OK    SOUTH    AFRICA 

•fjss  acquisition,  transfer  ":ng  the*  whole  of  DC  Beers  mine,  and  the 
interests  of   the   lu^c    in    Beers   Mining  Company  in  all  outside 

Consolidated  Mines  pushed  forward  stead- 

of  a  comprehensive  consolidation.      The 

runt  step  was  the  securing  of  the  whole  of 

i:  greatest  producing  tactor  next  to  De  Beers. 

L   the  property  of   the  Kimberley  Central 

i-.mpany  was  finally  turned  over  to  the  Con- 

bcrn  described  in  the  preceding  chapter. 

,)u   '..t    Dutoitspan  and   Bultfontein    mines  a 

These  mines,  at  the  time,  were  not 

producing  cs,  rind  ;:  was  practically  certain  that 

GROUP  OF   LIFE   GOVERNORS.    DIRECTORS,  GENERAL  ^AACER,  ^tf 


SECRETARY,  '  DE   BEERS  CONSOLI  DATED  ',  MlNE&  ^Mlf* 

i  diamonds  to  the  value  or  over  half  a 


.  productic#!«'was  rapidly  declin- 

From  Left  to  Right 

E.  Bernheim,  Woolf  Joef>mong  the   asset; 

W.  H.  Craven,  Seeret*ry\\^  •  Ci  E.  Niwdwere  a  number  of 

Gardner  F.  Williams.  &nq*hMA&gW  est         H.  Mosentbal|)urojtspan    and 

L.  Breitmeyer,     .r;:Vc;n   Consolidated   C<,&4'  Rhodes'  W  ^rfurence 
Lieutenant  Colonel  D.  Harris.  B.  I.  Barnato,  Life  Governor, 

Francis  Oats. 

'"G.  V.  Compton.  Consolidated 

<  -v  corporation  attained   complete  posses- 

prfip-rties  in   consideration  of  the  payment 

During   the   second  year  after  the 

)iulat:cd    "vltnt's   purchased   the  property 

u:   Mininij  Ci.'npany,  the  Compagnie  Generale 

•    irucrest   in   the       ''u:\icras  mines   in  the   Brazils), 

*   Di.iiTiaiu'i  M  miner  Company,  and  the  United  Diamond 

:  Company,  representing  nearly  all  the  properties  of  ma- 

•.\{iK*nc     arul        tent    in    Dutoitspan    mine    except  the 

•-ipanv  During    tlie    same    period   the 

-•  bi;',;jlr   iii    the    Bultfontein    Mining   Com- 

-   Boi.a  Dhinujnd  Mining  Company,  and  the  South 

Mining   Company,  comprising  a  considerable 

:••'.<•'".    ••{   the   ;>mprities   in    fhe    Bultfontein   mine. 


THE    ESSENTIAL    COMBINATION 


303 


304      THE    DIAMOND    MINES   OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

The  actual  cost  of  the  properties  thus  acquired  by  the  Con- 
solidated Mines  was  approximately  ^14,500,000.  There  would 
have  been  no  difficulty  in  expanding  the  capital  of  the  corpora- 
tion by  the  issuing  of  shares  to  an  amount  sufficient  to  cover 
this  immense  acquisition,  but  a  more  conservative  course  was 
adopted.  It  was  decided  not  to  increase  the  capital  of  the  cor- 
poration beyond  ^£3, 950,000.  The  purchases  in  excess  of  this 
issue  were  provided  for  by  the  issue  of  debentures.  The  adop- 
tion of  this  plan  necessitated  a  provision  for  covering  very  heavy 
fixed  charges  in  the  early  years  of  the  operations  of  the  Consoli- 
dated Mines  ;  but  this  obligation  was  undertaken  with  confidence 
in  view  of  the  assurance  of  the  control  of  the  diamond  market, 
brought  about  through  the  consolidation,  and  the  actual  return 
in  the  rapidly  increasing  output  of  the  mines  with  systematic 
and  scientific  development. 

During  the  financial  year  following  the  completion  of  con- 
solidation, De  Beers  produced  2,195,112  carats  of  diamonds. 
This  product,  including  the  proceeds  of  diamonds  from  debris 
washing,  realized  in  the  market  ^"3,287,728.  In  that  year  the 
total  weight  of  diamonds  produced  by  all  the  mines  in  the 
Kimberley  division  was  2,415,655  carats.  Thus  approximately 
ninety  per  cent  of  the  total  production  was  then  furnished  by  the 
Consolidated  Mines.  The  net  profit  of  the  operations  for  the 
year  exceeded  £  i  ,000,000  sterling,  and  two  half-yearly  dividends 
of  ten  per  cent  each  were  paid  to  the  shareholders.  The  actual 
cost  of  winning  over  2,000,000  carats  of  diamonds,  including 
all  expenses  at  the  mines  and  office  charges,  was  a  little  over  a 
million  sterling,  or  roughly  los.  per  carat.  The  difference 
between  the  estimated  net  profit  and  the  costs  of  operation 
was  expended  in  the  payment  of  interest  on  debentures  and 
obligations  and  in  provision  for  their  redemption,  and  in  the  set- 
ting aside  of  an  exceedingly  liberal  provision  of  over  ^500,000 
as  an  offset  for  depreciation  of  plant,  etc. 

The  directors  of  the  De  Beers  Consolidated  Mines  could 
point  with  high  satisfaction  to  this  profitable  showing  in  contrast 
with  the  records  of  disastrous  competition  and  conflicting  mine 


THE    ESSENTIAL   COMBINATION  305 

operations.  No  exact  statistics  are  obtainable  of  the  production 
in  the  early  years,  when  no  official  returns  from  the  mines  were 
made.  The  late  Barney  Barnato,  who  made  a  special  study  of 
the  probable  rate  of  production,  estimated  the  product  from 
1873  to  1880  as  ranging  annually  from  a  million  to  a  million 
and  a  half  carats.  After  1880  there  was  a  considerable  increase, 
and  in  1883,  when  official  returns  were  first  rendered,  the  quan- 
tity of  diamonds  produced  was  2,319,234  carats.  The  average 
value  of  this  product  was  reckoned  at  2os.  \\d.  giving  a  total 
of  ^2,359,466.  In  1884  the  product  was  2,264,786  carats, 
valued  at  ^2,562,623,  showing  an  average  of  23  j.  i^d.  per 
carat.  This  was  the  top  notch  in  market  value,  for  in  the 
following  year,  1885,  the  diamonds  produced  amounted  to 
2,287,261  carats,  with  an  average  value  of  only  19^.  ^d.  per 
carat.  In  1886  the  production  reached  the  high  total  of 
3,047, 63 9|-  carats,  but  the  demand  increased  in  proportion,  so 
that  the  average  selling  price  was  fully  is.  higher  per  carat  than 
during  the  previous  year.  In  1887  and  1888,  through  the 
increased  facilities  for  production  in  De  Beers  and  Kimberley 
mines,  the  total  output  rose  to  3,646,889  carats,  and  35565,780! 
carats  successively.  The  average  price  during  these  two  years 
ranged  from  iis.  6d.  per  carat  to  iis.  \\d.  but  the  market  was 
flooded,  and  prices  were  falling  perilously  close  to  the  cost  of 
production  even  in  the  richer  mines.  There  was  no  assurance 
of  any  far-sighted  regulation  of  the  output  and  market  prices, 
and,  lacking  this,  diamond  mining  properties  were  commonly 
reckoned  as  little  better  than  gambling  ventures.  It  has  been 
clearly  shown  how  this  disastrous  condition  was  at  once  changed 
to  stable  assurance  and  prosperity  by  the  control  of  the  new 
organization. 

To  the  shareholders  in  the  mines,  after  this  reorganization 
was  effected,  the  returns  were  unprecedented.  This  profit  was 
largely  due  to  the  complete  control  of  production,  systematic 
operation,  and  regulation  of  the  output ;  but  the  comparative 
showing  was  also  greatly  enhanced  by  the  shrewdness  of  the 
financiering  in  the  organization,  and  the  withdrawal  of  inflation 


306      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


from  the  stocks  of  the  various  mining  properties  included  in  the 
new  incorporation  and  its  leased  holdings.  The  capital  of  De 
Beers  Mines  before  consolidation  was  £"2,009,000.  The  capital 
of  the  Central  Company  was  £1,779,650.  De  Beers  stock  at 
the  time  of  consolidation  was  selling  at  £40  a  share,  represent- 
ing a  capital  of  £8,036,000.  The  stock  of  the  Central  Com- 
pany, controlling  the  Kimberley  mine, 
was  selling  at  £50  for  each  £10  share, 
making  a  total  valuation  of  £8,898,250 
for  the  mine.  At  this  market  estimate 
the  valuation  of  the  two  great  mines  was 
£17,934,250.  The  capital  of  the  Du- 
toitspan  was  approximately  £3,500,000, 
and  of  Bultfontein,  £2,000,000  nomi- 
nally, making  a  gross  valuation  for  the 
four  mines  of  £23,434,250.  By  consoli- 
Mr.  E.  R.  Tymms,  Secretary  of  dation  the  capital  stock  was  compressed  to 

the  London  Board,  De  Beers       /•>  grO,OOO,  and    almost   absolute    Control 

Consolidated  Mines  Ltd.  f*»*J>7J  ^     f 

of  the  mining  in  all  four  of  these  great 

properties  was  secured  at  an  annual  charge  of  about  £320,000  for 
interest  on  debentures  and  for  leases  of  two  companies,  one  in 
Dutoitspan  mine  and  one  in  Bultfontein  mine.  The  business 
of  the  Company  grew  so  rapidly  that  it  was  necessary  to  establish 
transfer  as  well  as  general  business  offices  in  London. 

In  the  year  1901  the  Company's  shares,  which  had  increased 
in  value  to  more  than  £40  for  a  £$  share,  were  split  up  as  fol- 
lows :  The  capital  was  increased  from  ^£3, 9 50,000  to  ^£4,500,000. 
The  shares  were  divided  into  two  classes,  800,000  preference 
shares  of  £"2  los.  each,  which  will  have  a  fixed  cumulative  divi- 
dend at  the  rate  of  forty  per  cent  per  annum  before  the  deferred 
shares  participate,  and  1,000,000  deferred  shares  of  £"2  IQJ.  It 
will  be  remembered  that  in  the  formation  of  the  De  Beers 
Consolidated  Mines  Limited,  provision  was  made  for  five  Life 
Governors,  who  were  to  receive  twenty-five  per  cent  of  the 
profits  of  the  Company  after  an  annual  dividend  of  thirty-six 
per  cent  had  been  paid.  When  the  reconstruction  took  place 
the  Company  purchased  the  interests  of  the  Life  Governors 
and  gave  in  payment  160,000  deferred  shares. 


CHAPTER   XI 


SYSTEMATIC     MINING 


UST  acknowledgment  has  been  made  in  a  former 
chapter  of  the  essential  service  rendered  to  the 
diamond  mine  owners  by  the  device  of  Mr. 
Edward  Jones  for  underground  work  beneath 
the  fallen  reef  covering  the  bottom  of  the  open 
pits.  This  was,  however,  confessedly  only  a 
temporary  makeshift,  enabling  the  claim-holders  to  defray  the 
heavy  costs  of  sinking  shafts  through  the  hard  rock  outside  the 
craters,  and  pursuing  some  systematic  plan  for  the  extraction  of 
the  diamond-bearing  breccia  by  underground  workings.  Deep- 
shaft  sinking  was  undertaken  with  renewed  heart  by  several 
companies  owning  claims  in  Kimberley  and  De  Beers  mines, 
but  for  some  years  there  was  an  obvious  lack  of  essential 
cooperation  and  unity  of  method.  Eight  shafts  were  sunk,  or 
were  under  way,  in  1885,  within  and  without  the  craters,  for 
opening  De  Beers  and  Kimberley  mines,  and  through  these 
shafts  the  blue  ground  was  extracted  by  four  different  methods 
of  stoping,  none  of  which  was  satisfactory.  The  system  insti- 
tuted by  the  Central  Company,  the  largest  operator  in  Kim- 
berley mine,  illustrates  sufficiently  the  inherent  defects  in  all. 
Here  galleries  fifteen  feet  wide  were  driven  to  the  right  and 
left  of  a  main  tunnel,  with  pillars  fifteen  feet  thick  between 
them.  Passages  or  winzes  for  broken  ground  were  sunk 
at  short  intervals  to  a  tunnel  below.  The  ground  was  stoped  to 
the  height  of  fifteen  feet  above  the  main  tunnel,  and  then  below 
it  until  the  stope  reached  the  next  level.  The  passes  became 
filled  frequently  with  large  pieces  of  ground,  and  had  to  be 
cleared.  Under  this  system  the  mine  was  assuming  the  shape 

307 


3o8       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

of  a  section  of  a  gigantic  honeycomb  cut  in  two  longitudinally, 
the  spaces  for  the  honey  representing  the  worked-out  part  of  the 
mine,  and  the  comb,  the  support  for  the  superincumbent  mass 
of  debris.  After  a  short  period  of  working,  the  pillars  began  to 
show  signs  of  crushing,  and  the  mine  was  considered  too  danger- 
ous to  allow  the  men  to  remain  in  it.  They  were  withdrawn 
just  in  time  to  prevent  a  disaster,  for  the  whole  underground 


The  Last  of  Open  Mining,  Kimberley  Mine. 

works  collapsed  shortly  after  the  last  man  had  left  the  mine. 
Fortunately  no  one  was  killed.  The  mine  had  to  be  reopened 
from  top  to  bottom,  for  every  underground  excavation  was  filled 
up  at  the  close  of  the  year  1888. 

The  errors  in  engineering  were  further  accentuated,  during 
the  early  stages  of  underground  mining,  by  the  jealous  bickering 
of  rival  owners,  which  was  constantly  impeding  the  progress  of 
the  workings,  and  it  was  seemingly  impracticable  to  agree  upon 
any  plan  securing  concert  of  operation  and  expert  opening  of  the 


SYSTEMATIC    MINING 


3°9 


PLAN  OF  DE  BEERS  MINE 

TOO  FEET  LEVEL 
SYSTEM  OF  WORKING  1887 

THE  SQUARES  REPRESENT  CLAIMS 
31  FT*    BY  31  FT. 


X    \ 


ROCK  SHAFT 

B 


PLAN  OF  DE  BEERS  MINE. 

800  FT.  LEVEL 

SYSTEM  OF  WORKING.  1888 


310       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

mines.  At  the  end  of  the  year  1885,  although  the  need  of 
amalgamation  of  claims  was  obvious  and  imperative,  there  were 
still,  as  has  been  noted,  ninety-eight  separate  holdings  in  the 
four  mines.  Prior  to  the  consolidation  of  the  holdings  in  De 
Beers  and  Kimberley  mines,  the  underground  workings  were 
prosecuted  with  the  general  design  of  withstanding  pressure  and 
sliding  of  the  reef  by  leaving  sufficient  solid  blue  ground,  in  the 
form  of  "  floors  "  or  "  roofs,"  between  the  series  of  levels,  sup- 
ported by  buttresses  and  pillars  of  blue  ground.  Costly  experi- 
ence by  frequent  collapses  of  the  roofs  and  crushing  of  the  pillars 

SECTION  THROUGH    DE  BEERS  MINE    LOOKING  NORTH 


proved  that  the  levels  were  too  near  one  another,  and  that  gal- 
leries driven  full  size  from  the  offsets  were  difficult  to  maintain 
and  unsafe  for  the  workmen. 

The  heavy  expense  of  sinking  vertical  shafts  and  driving 
tunnels  through  the  hard  rock  surrounding  the  mine  had  led  to 
the  adoption  of  inclined  shafts  in  order  to  reach  the  blue  ground 
more  quickly  ;  but,  for  several  reasons,  these  inclines  were  not 
adapted  for  the  prosecution  of  deep  underground  works.  The 
chief  defects  may  be  briefly  summarized.  They  were  difficult 
to  maintain,  as  they  were  sunk  obliquely  through  the  horizontal 
strata  of  the  shale,  which  frequently  gave  way  and  crushed  the 
shaft  timbers.  Secondly,  being  inclined  to  the  horizon  (De 
Beers  56°,  and  Kimberley  Standard  Shaft  32°)  and  situated  not 
far  from  the  margins  of  the  mines,  they  soon  reached  blue  ground, 


SYSTEMATIC    MINING 


311 


E   o 

O    2 


5    i 


3i2       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF    SOUTH    AFRICA 

and  were  continued  down  in  this  breccia,  which  must  sooner  or 
later  be  mined.  Some  of  these  shafts,  as  at  De  Beers,  had  a 
uniform  slope  from  top  to  bottom,  while  others,  as  at  Kimberley 
mine,  changed  to  a  steeper  slope  in  depth  and  in  one  case  to 
a  vertical  shaft.  De  Beers  No.  2  worked  well  to  the  depth  of 
800  feet,  and  the  Standard  shaft,  Kimberley  mine,  was  fairly 
serviceable  to  the  depth  of  845  feet.  The  shafts  were  not  sunk 
with  the  view  of  putting  in  proper  pumps,  and  when  steam  was 
taken  into  the  mines  through  them,  for  pumping  purposes,  the 


OUR 


PLAN  OF  KIMBERLEY  MINE 

1000   FT.    LEVEL 


FRENCH  SHAFT 


natives  had  to  pass  up  and  down  the  same  shafts  by  means  of 
ladders.  As  all  the  inclined  shafts  were  upcasts,  the  heat  was 
insufferable. 

When  I  took  charge  of  De  Beers  mine,  in  the  year  1887,  it 
was  worked  under  what  was  then  known  as  the  Gouldie  system, 
which  had  been  copied  from  the  hematite  mines  of  Cumberland, 
and  first  introduced  in  the  Kimberley  mine  by  Mr.  Joseph 
Gouldie,  then  manager  for  W.  A.  Hall,  and  afterwards  mine 
manager  of  De  Beers  Mining  Company.  At  De  Beers  mine  an 
inclined  shaft  had  been  sunk  to  the  5OO-foot  level,  with  inter- 
mediate levels  30  feet  apart  between  the  38o-foot  and  5OO-foot 
levels. 


O    £ 

C/3      n 


a 


-• 

W  iv  U    :  NW  '•        '        1-  •'••!  - '  - •     ' '"W I    ^  /  '       --  *•''  ' 


lilP»tia*i! 


SYSTEMATIC    MINING 


3*3 


SECTION  OF  KIMBERLEY  MINE 

LOOKING  NORTH 

100100   100  900  >00  400  BOO  600  FT. 


SECTION  OF  KIMBERLEY  MINE 
LOOKING  EAST 

100500        100     200     900     400    500  FT. 


/ 


3H      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF    SOUTH    AFRICA 

The  plans  on  other  pages  illustrate  the  manner  in  which 
the  various  levels  were  laid  off.  Tunnels  were  driven  across  the 
crater  at  De  Beers  mine  from  west  to  east,  about  120  feet  apart, 
and  galleries  18  feet  wide  and  18  feet  high  were  opened  every  36 
feet  along  the  main  tunnels,  and  were  worked  up  to  within  12 
feet  of  the  loose  ground  in  the  top  levels.  Pillars  of  solid  blue 
ground  18  feet  thick  were  left  between  the  galleries,  but  later 
on  first  the  roof  and  then  the  pillars  were  taken  out. 

This  method  of  mining  was  fairly  successful  for  a  time ; 
but,  as  already  stated,  as  depth  was  attained,  the  roofs  of  the 
galleries  or  rooms  became  unsafe  before  the  galleries  were 
opened  through  to  those  on  the  next  level  above,  and  they  fre- 
quently gave  way,  thus  making  the  extraction  of  the  blue  ground 
exceedingly  difficult.  This  system  was  both  expensive  and 
dangerous.  No  timber  was  used  except  in  the  main  tunnels  or 
drifts,  the  nature  of  the  blue  ground  being  such  that  the  roofs 
and  sides  of  the  excavations  stood  fairly  well  for  a  short  time, 
provided  they  were  well  ventilated. 

In  other  parts  of  De  Beers  mine  various  companies  were 
working  or  trying  to  work  underground  ;  but  as  no  regular  sys- 
tem of  mining  could  be  carried  on  owing  to  the  irregular  shape 
of  their  holdings,  and  the  more  or  less  temporary  methods 
adopted,  it  was  clearly  impracticable  to  devise  and  carry  into 
effect  any  comprehensive  system  of  operation  for  the  rapid  and 
economical  handling  of  the  diamond-bearing  breccia  in  the 
craters,  until  the  union  of  all  the  claims  through  the  formation 
of  one  controlling  company  permitted  the  installation  of  a  single 
uniform  system  of  mining. 

It  has  already  been  narrated  how  this  was  effected  for 
De  Beers  mine  during  the  year  1887,  by  the  combination  of  all 
the  holdings  in  the  mine  into  one  company,  and  the  organiza- 
tion of  De  Beers  Consolidated  Mines  Limited,  in  March,  1888. 
Kimberley  mine  came  formally  into  the  possession  of  this  great 
corporation  on  the  ist  of  June,  1889,  and  controlling  interests 
in  the  other  two  mines,  Dutoitspan  and  Bultfontein,  were  also 
secured.  The  assured  control  of  all  the  mines  and  their  opera- 


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SYSTEMATIC    MINING  315 

tion  by  De  Beers  Consolidated  Mines  Limited  enabled  its 
directors  to  institute  and  conduct  successfully  a  single  broadly 
comprehensive  plan  for  extracting  the  diamond-bearing  rock 
and  for  disposing  to  the  best  advantage  the  total  product  of 
their  mines. 

This  system  of  mining  was  devised  and  applied  by  me 
shortly  after  my  appointment  as  general  manager  of  the 
De  Beers  Consolidated  Mines  Limited,  and  was  based  essen- 
tially on  a  method  suggested  by  the  miners  themselves  and 
without  reference  to  any  other  system.  Instead  of  attempting 
to  withstand,  even  for  a  time,  the  pressure  of  the  superincum- 
bent mass  of  broken  reef,  the  new  system  contemplated  the 
caving  in  and  filling  of  the  excavations,  after  the  precious  blue 
ground  had  been  extracted. 

In  order  to  make  the  output  of  diamond-bearing  ground  as 
great  as  possible,  the  levels  in  De  Beers  mine  were  at  first 
opened  up  in  the  new  system  according  to  the  following  plan  :  — 

When  the  numerous  small  tunnels  had  been  driven  to  the 
margin  of  the  mine,  i.e.  to  the  point  where  they  reached  the  sides 
of  the  crater,  the  blue  ground  was  stoped  on  both  sides  of  and 
above  each  tunnel  until  a  chamber  was  formed  extending  along 
the  face  of  the  rock  for  100  or  more  feet,  with  an  average  width 
of  about  20  feet,  and  about  20  feet  high.  The  roof  of  the  cham- 
ber or  gallery  was  then  blasted  down  or  allowed  to  break  down 
by  the  pressure  of  the  overlying  mass  of  broken  diamond-bear- 
ing ground  or  debris.  I  mention  diamond-bearing  ground  here, 
for  in  the  early  stages  of  underground  mining  there  was  an 
enormous  amount  of  this  ground  which  had  been  left  behind 
when  open  mining  was  discontinued,  and  had  been  crushed 
either  by  the  moving  sides  of  the  immense  opening  or  by  the 
collapse  of  the  underground  pillars  when  mined  by  the  old  sys- 
tem. It  happened  frequently,  after  breaking  through  to  the 
loose  ground  above,  that  clean  diamond-bearing  ground  would 
run  down  as  fast  as  it  was  removed  for  weeks  or  months  at  a 
time.  The  galleries  would  at  times  become  blocked  with  large 
pieces  of  blue  ground,  which  had  to  be  blasted,  and  then  a 


3i6      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

further  run  of  blue  ground  would  follow.  When  the  blue 
ground  was  worked  back  toward  the  centre  of  the  crater,  larger 
boulders  or  fragments  of  basalt,  which  had  come  down  through 
the  loose  reef  from  the  surface,  would  be  met  with.  This  sys- 
tem of  working  would  be  continued  until  reef  alone  came 
down,  the  waste  or  reef  removed  being  sent  to  the  surface  by 
itself  and  dumped  on  the  reef  tips  ;  it  formed,  however,  only  an 
inconsiderable  proportion  (one  to  four  per  cent)  of  the  total 
output.  It  will  be  remembered  that,  when  the  roof  caved  in, 
the  gallery  was  nearly  full  of  blue  ground.  By  the  work  which 
followed,  only  a  part  of  this  ground  was  removed  by  the  men 
working  on  that  level,  the  miners  preferring  to  take  it  out  on  the 
next  level  below.  This  process  of  mining  was  repeated  from 
level  to  level  until  finally  there  was  no  more  loose  ground  to  be 
recovered.  The  cost  of  extracting  blue  ground  while  loose 
ground  existed  was  very  low. 


PLAN  OF  DE  BEERS  MINE 
800  FT,  LEVEL 

SYSTEM  OF  WORKING.  1 890 


VICTORIA  SHAFT 


CONTOUR ' 


Now  all  this  has  changed,  and  the  plan  of  opening  up  new 
levels  has  altered  somewhat,  but  the  system  remains  the  same. 
By  referring  to  the  plan,  given  above,  it  will  be  seen  that  the 


UNIVERSITY 


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UNIVERSI 


Zl        H        01         6  8         i  9          S  t          S  Z  \          0        0001 


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SYSTEMATIC    MINING  317 

levels  were  opened  around  the  east  end  of  the  mine.  When  the 
underground  works  had  reached  the  depth  of  800  feet  or  more, 
a  new  danger  appeared.  It  will  be  borne  in  mind  that  the  huge 
open  mines  are  filled  with  debris  from  the  sides,  caused  by  the 
removal  of  the  diamond-bearing  ground  by  open  quarrying  to 
depths  varying  from  200  to  500  feet.  As  the  supports  were 
removed,  the  sides  caved  and  filled  the  open  mine.  This  debris 
was  composed  of  the  surface  red  soil,  decomposed  basalt,  and 
friable  shale,  which  extended  from  the  surface  down  to  a  depth 
of  about  300  feet.  In  addition  to  the  debris  from  the  surround- 
ing rocks  there  were  huge  masses  of  "floating  shale,"  resembling 
indurated  blue  clay  more  than  shale.  Large  heaps  of  yellow 
ground  and  tailings,  which  the  early  diggers  deposited  near  the 
margin  of  the  mines,  and  west-end  yellow  ground  contributed 
to  the  mud-making  material.  The  black  shale  which  surrounds 
the  mines  disintegrates  rapidly  when  it  falls  into  them.  It  con- 
tains a  small  percentage  of  carbonaceous  matter,  and  a  large 
amount  of  iron  pyrites.  When  the  huge  masses  of  shale  fell 
into  the  open  mine,  they  frequently  ignited,  either  by  friction  or, 
more  probably,  by  spontaneous  combustion,  as  they  have  been 
known  to  do  on  the  reef  tips,  and  burned  for  months  and 
even  for  years  at  a  time.  These  masses  of  burned  shale  become 
soft  clay  and  form  a  part  of  the  mixture  which  fills  the  open 
crater.  This  debris  moves  down  as  the  blue  ground  is  mined 
from  underneath  it,  and  becomes  mixed  with  the  water  which 
flows  into  the  open  mine  from  the  surrounding  rock  and  with 
storm  water,  and  forms  mud.  This  overlying  mud  became  a 
menace  and  danger  to  the  men  working  in  the  levels  below. 
Frequent  mud  rushes  occurred  suddenly,  without  the  least  warn- 
ing, and  filled  up  hundreds  of  feet  of  tunnels  in  a  few  minutes, 
the  workmen  being  sometimes  caught  in  the  moving  mass.  It 
became  evident  that  the  method  of  working  shown  on  the  plan 
was  dangerous  in  case  a  mud  rush  took  place,  the  men  being 
sometimes  either  shut  in  or  buried  in  the  mud  coming  from 
the  opposite  side  of  the  mine.  It  was  decided,  therefore,  to  work 
the  mines  from  one  side  only,  and  to  have  the  offsets  to  the 


318      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

rock  connected  one  with  the  other  at  as  few  points  as  would  still 
allow  the  ventilation  of  the  working  faces.     The  plan  illustrated 


ROCK  SHAIT 


PLAN  OF  DE  BEERS  MINE 

10OOFEET  LEVEL 


in  the  above  figure  shows  the  method  which  was  then  adopted 
and  is  still  in  use.  Kimberley  mine  is  worked  on  about  the 
same  general  system. 


SYSTEMATIC    MINING 


The  method  of  laying  out  the  workings  is  also  here  shown. 
Main  tunnels  are  driven  across  the  crater  upon  its  longer  axis, 


and,  at  right  angles  from  these,  small  tunnels  are  driven  out 
every  30  feet  until  they  reach  the  hard  rock  on  the  south  side  of 
the  mine.  These  tunnels  are  widened,  first  along  the  rock  until 
they  connect  one  with  another,  and,  at  the  same  time,  the  roofs, 
or  "  backs,"  are  stoped  up  until  they  are  within  a  few  feet  of  the 


SKETCH  SHOWING  METHOD  OF  STOPING 


MAIN  TUNNEL 

PLAN  IV 


SECTION  I 


SECTION  II 


SECTION  III 


SECTION  IV 


320      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

loose  ground 
above,  thus 
forming  long 
galleries,  filled 
more  or  less  with 
blue  ground, 
upon  which  the 

men  stand  when  drilling  holes  in  the  backs.     The  working  levels 
were  at  first  30  feet  apart  vertically,  but,  for  greater  economy, 


Method  of  Sloping,  Vertical  Section. 


SYSTEMATIC    MINING 


321 


the  distance  was  soon  changed  to  40  feet.  The  broken  blue 
ground  lying  in  the  galleries  is  taken  out,  as  a  rule,  before  there 
are  any  signs  of  the  roof  giving  way.  At  times  this  is  impos- 
sible, and  the  roofs  cave  upon  the  broken  ground,  and  the  blue 
ground  is  covered  with  reef.  As  the  roofs  cave  or  are  blasted 
down,  the  blue  ground  is  removed,  and  the  loose  reef  lying  above 
it  comes  down  and  fills  the  gallery.  Tunnels  are  often  driven 


Timbering  Tunnels. 

through  this  loose  reef,  and  the  blue  ground,  which  has  been  cut 
off  and  buried  by  debris,  is  taken  out ;  but  it  is  sometimes  left 
for  those  working  the  next  level  below  to  extract. 

After  the  first  "  cut "  near  the  rock  is  worked  out,  another 
cut  is  made,  and  in  this  manner  the  various  levels  are  worked 
back,  the  upper  level  in  advance  of  the  one  below,  forming  ter- 
races as  shown  in  section  on  page  320.  In  De  Beers  mine  there 
are  now  eleven  levels  on  which  work  is  progressing,  commencing 
at  the  depth  of  1280  feet  and  extending  down  to  the  i72O-foot 


322       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


Timbered  Tunnels  at  the  looo-foot  Level,  Kimberley  Mine. 

level.  At  Kimberley  mine  nine  levels  are  being  worked,  from 
the  i84O-foot  to  the  2i6o-foot  level  inclusive.  The  galleries  are 
not  supported  in  any  way  by  timbers,  but  all  tunnels  in  soft  blue 

ground  are  timbered 
with  sets  of  two  props 
and  a  cap  of  round 
timber,  and  are  cov- 
ered with  inch  and  a 
half  lagging. 

Soft  blue  ground 
is  drilled  with  long 
jumper  drills  sharp- 
ened at  both  ends. 
In  hard  blue  ground, 
drills  and  single-hand 

Natives  drilling,  De  Beers  Mine. 


hammers       are 

The  native  workers  become  very  skilful  in  both  methods  of 
drilling,  and  do  quite  as  much  work  as  white  men  would  do 
under  similar  conditions. 


SYSTEMATIC    MINING 


Shafts 


323 


The  grand  winding  shafts  and  plant  by  which  the  enormous 
output  of  diamond-bearing  ground  is  brought  to  the  surface  are 
illustrated  in  accompanying  figures.  The  present  working  shafts 
are  all  vertical.  De  Beers  rock  shaft  was  the  first  large  vertical 
shaft  of  any  importance,  from  the  present  mining  point  of  view, 
which  was  sunk  in  any  of  the  mines.  It  is  20  feet  by  6  feet  in 
size  inside  timbers,  and  contains  four  compartments,  two  for 
skips  lifting  blue  ground,  one  for  a  cage  for  taking  men  and 
material  up  and  down,  and  one  for  pumps  and  ladderway.  A 


Detail  of  Sets  for  Rock  Shaft. 


balance  weight  for  the  cage  runs  in  the  pump  compartment, 
which  is  also  the  downcast  shaft  through  which  the  whole  mine 
is  ventilated. 

No.  i  is  the  upcast  shaft.  It  has  two  compartments  for 
skips,  two  for  cages,  one  for  pipes,  etc.,  and  a  double  ladderway. 

At  Kimberley  mine  the  rock  shaft  is  a  duplicate  of  De  Beers 
rock  shaft,  except  that  the  pump  compartment  is  larger. 

At  De  Beers,  tunnels  1 1  feet  wide  by  8  feet  high  have  been 
driven  from  the  rock  shaft  at  the  800,  1000,  1200,  1400,  and 
iy2O-foot  levels,  and  from  No.  i  shaft  at  the  380,  800,  and 
i4OO-foot  levels. 


324      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

At  Kimberley  mine  the  rock  shaft  is  connected  by  similar 
tunnels  with  the  mine  on  the  1000,  1200,  1520,  1840,  and  2160- 
foot  levels.  The  present  depths  (1904)  of  De  Beers  shafts  are 
2076  feet  and  1579  feet  respectively,  and  of  Kimberley  rock 
shaft  2539  feet. 

Trucks  holding  16  cubic  feet  transport  the  blue  ground  in 
the  mines  from  the  loading  places  to  the  main  chutes  or  passes, 
and  from  these  to  the  shaft.  The  trucks  are  hauled  by  an 


A  Shaft  Station. 


endless  chain  which  rests  upon  V-shaped  clips  fastened  to  the 
trucks,  the  motive  power  being  supplied  by  engines  driven  by 
compressed  air,  carried  through  pipes  from  the  surface.1  At  the 
shaft  there  is  a  large  station  cut  out  of  the  solid  rock,  some  30 
feet  wide,  and  extending  back  toward  the  mine  for  a  distance  of 
70  feet  to  the  point  where  the  tunnel  (8  by  1 1  feet)  commences. 
There  is  an  extension  on  one  end  of  the  shaft  for  a  small  cage- 
way  to  bring  up  any  ground  that  may  spill  over  the  skips  while 
being  loaded.  This  prevents  delays  in  the  skip  hoisting.  The 
shaft  is  also  lengthened  for  a  few  feet  at  the  pump  end,  where  a 
set  of  pumps  is  put  in. 

1  See  Appendix  I. 


SYSTEMATIC    MINING 


325 


Loading  the  Trucks. 

As  one  descends  the  shaft  in  the  cage  in  pitch  darkness  and 
suddenly  comes  to  a  large  opening  brightly  lighted  with  numer- 
ous electric  lamps,  the  scene  is  weird  and  confusing.  A  score  of 
natives,  half  dressed,  each  vying  with  the  other  in  shouting  his 
own  comments  upon  the  visitors  as  they  come  forth  from  the 
cage ;  the  whirl  of  heavy  iron  trucks  as  they  go  to  and  fro ;  the 
banging  of  the  tippers  as  they  turn  over  and  deposit  the  contents 
of  the  enclosed  truck  into  a  chute  below,  —  all  present  a  picture 
unique  in  itself  and  only  to  be  seen  in  passing  through  the  shafts 
at  De  Beers  and  Kimberley  mines.  Those  who  have  travelled 
through  the  native  centres,  or  have  seen  the  negroes  loitering 
about  the  towns,  and  have  thought  them  lazy,  indolent,  beer- 
drinking  beings,  should  visit  the  diamond  mines,  and  especially 
the  scene  upon  the  "flat  sheet"  as  described  above,  and  they 
will  \get  a  new  impression  of  the  working  capacity  of  these 
despised  black  men.  The  natives  working  in  the  diamond 


mines,  if  they  are  old  hands  in  the  service,  are  uniformly  active 
and  industrious  men,  while  natives  fresh  from  the  kraals  are  soon 
taught  their  duties,  which  they  learn  to  perform  with  nearly  as 
much  skill  as  most  European  miners. 


SYSTEMATIC    MINING 


327 


•iOO 
•-jOO 
10© 


"J{  RIVETS 


5-2-Vz » 

^-  VJ    RIVETS 

COUNTERSUNK 


FRONT  VIEW 


INVERTED  PLAN 

PLAN   OF  SKIP  FOR  SIX   LOADS. 


OF   THE 

UNIVERSITY 

OF 


328      THE   DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


Main  Shaft,  Kimberley  Mine. 

No  more  rapid  handling  and  extraction  of  the  blue  ground 
seems  possible  than  is  effected  by  the  aid  of  these  alert  workers 
and  the  perfected  mechanical  devices.  As  soon  as  the  loaded 
trucks  reach  the  shaft,  they  are  tipped  into  loading  chutes  hold- 
ing six  truck-loads  (96  cubic  feet).  As  the  skip  reaches  the 
bottom  a  door  is  opened,  and  the  contents  of  the  chute  run  into 
the  skip  and  are  hoisted  to  the  surface.  Experience  has  shown 
that  the  best  results  are  obtained  by  sending  up  loaded  skips 
from  one  level  at  a  time.  The  simple  and  efficient  device  early 
adopted  in  the  mines  for  tipping  the  loads  from  the  trucks  into 
the  skip  at  No.  2  incline  of  De  Beers  consisted  of  an  iron 
chute.  Four  end-tipping  trucks  were  placed  close  against  the 
edge  of  the  chute  and  the  catches  loosened.  As  soon  as  an 
empty  skip  was  lowered  past  the  chute  the  trucks  were  tipped 
and  the  loads  ran  into  the  chutes  so  rapidly  that  the  engine- 
driver  frequently  received  a  signal  to  hoist  before  his  engine  had 
been  stopped.  The  skip  in  this  incline  held  64  cubic  feet,  or 
four  truck  loads  weighing  1600  Ibs.  each. 


SYSTEMATIC    MINING 


329 


The  time  of  the  journey  through  the  shaft  now  varies  only 
a  little  with  depth,  being  from  thirty-five  to  forty  seconds  from 
the  1 200  or  i52o-foot  levels.  On  reaching  the  surface,  the  blue 
ground  is  tipped  automatically  from  the  skips  into  loading  boxes. 
The  "self-dumping"  skips  in  present  use  were  introduced  by 
me  in  1888,  and  were  made  from  drawings  supplied  by  the  Union 
Iron  Works  of  San  Francisco,  and  are  similar  to  the  skips  used 
in  the  mining  districts  of  the  Pacific  Coast.  (On  page  327 
are  shown  the  plans  for 
the  skip  and  the  manner 
of  tipping  into  the  surface 
chutes.)  From  these  chutes 
the  blue  ground  is  loaded 
into  side -tipping  trucks 
holding  20  cubic  feet  each. 
The  average  weight  of  the 
blue  ground  in  a  surface 
truck  is  2000  pounds.  The 
trucks  used  underground 
hold  1 6  cubic  feet,  and  are 
end-tipping  in  the  inter- 
mediate levels  where  the 
ground  is  dumped  into 
passes,  but  have  solid  ends 
on  the  main  levels  where 
revolving  tippers  are  used.  The  Rock  Shaft>  De  Beers  Mine- 

From  the  depositing  surface  boxes  at  the  winding  shafts,  the 
ground  is  taken  by  means  of  an  endless  wire  rope  haulage  to  the 
"  floors,"  where  it  is  treated  as  described  in  another  chapter. 

Record  Hoisting 

With  alert  and  orderly  handling  of  the  blue  ground  in  the 
mines,  the  rapidity  of  extraction  has  advanced  to  extraordinary 
record  points.  During  the  month  of  July,  1889,  142,567 
loads  were  hoisted  through  a  single  shaft  in  No.  2  incline, 
De  Beers  mine.  The  best  day's  work  of  24  hours  was  6222 


330      THE    DIAMOND    MINES   OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


loads  of  1 6  cubic  feet,  or  4977  short  tons.  For  an  hour  at 
a  time  hoisting  was  carried  on  at  this  shaft  at  the  rate  of  five 
skip-loads  every  three  minutes,  or  400  truck-loads  an  hour, 

lifted  from  the  7OO-foot  level, 
a  distance  of  840  feet  through 
the  inclined  shaft.  The  total 
amount  of  blue  ground 
hoisted  during  the  fiscal  year 
from  April  i,  1889,  to  March 
31,  1890,  was  1,355,089 
loads,  aggregating  1,084,071 
tons  of  2000  pounds.  This 
remarkable  record  was  made 
under  unfavorable  condi- 
tions, because  the  hoisting  en- 
gine was  small,  nominally  of 
70  horse-power,  and  not  de- 

VERTICAl.  TANDEM  COMPOUND  CONDENSING  WINWNO  ENGINES  signed   foT  SUCh    TapJd    SCTvicC. 

With  the  construction  of  new  shafts  and  the  setting  up  of 
engines  and  fittings  of  the 
best  and  latest  designs,  the 
efficiency  of  operation  was 
greatly  increased.  Two  types 
of  winding  engines  have  been 
erected,  and  it  is  interesting 
to  follow  the  changes  which 
have  been  made  in  this  por- 
tion of  the  plant.  The  first 
large  engine  erected  by  the 
De  Beers  Company  was  the 
one  at  De  Beers  rock  shaft. 
Its  cylinders  were  24  inches 
in  diameter,  with  a  stroke  of 
5  feet.  It  had  two  drums, 
each  4  feet  4^  inches  in  width 
and  10  feet  6  inches  in  diam- 


VERTICAU  TANDEM  COMPOUND  CONDENSING  WINDING  ENGINES 


SYSTEMATIC   MINING 


VERTICAL  TANDEM  COMPOUND  CONDENSING  WINDING  ENGINES 


eter,  with  a  grooved  tread  to  prevent  friction 
on  the  rope.  This  engine  was  built  by  well- 
known  makers  of  winding  engines,  whose 
works  are  too  near  the  cheap  coal  centres 
of  England.  The  engine  was  what  is 
called  in  America  a  "  sawmill  engine." 
In  the  timber  districts  of  America,  the 
boilers  are  fired  with  slabs  cut  from  the 
round  logs  in  squaring  them.  Enor- 
mous quantities  of  these  slabs  accu- 
mulate about  the  mills,  where  they 
must  be  consumed  in  some  way,  or 
carted  away  at  a  considerable  ex- 
pense. To  get  rid  of  the  slabs, 
engines  that  consume  the 
greatest  amount  of  steam 
are  those  most  sought  after. 
In  South  Africa,  on  the  contrary,  the  extraordinary  consumption 
of  steam  was  a  heavy  drawback.  Welsh  steam  coal  then  cost 
j£8  los.  ($41.25)  per  ton  of  2000  pounds,  delivered  at  Kim- 
berley,  so  this  "sawmill"  engine  was  converted  from  two  high- 
pressure  cylinders  to  a  cross  compound,  with  cylinders  of  26 
inches  and  40  inches  diameter,  and  the  consumption  of  fuel 
dropped  more  than  30  per  cent.  After  several  years  of  con- 
stant service,  the  engine  was  stopped  June  n,  1896,  the  old 
drum  and  crank  shaft,  weighing  32  tons,  were  taken  out  bodily, 
and  a  new  set,  weighing  40  tons,  substituted  and  made  ready 
for  service  in  less  than  48  hours.  With  this  new  outfit  there 
was  soon  a  series  of  record-breaking  performances,  which  are 
given  below. 

At  the  Kimberley  mine,  the  main  or  rock  shaft  was  started 
on  the  north  side  of  the  mine  in  March,  1889.  In  the  first  year 
this  shaft  was  sunk  to  the  depth  of  699  feet,  and,  in  the  following 
year,  it  was  pushed  to  the  depth  of  nearly  1300  feet.  The  driv- 
ing of  the  tunnel  to  the  mine  from  this  shaft  on  the  looo-foot 
level  showed  how  exactly  vertical  was  the  wall  of  the  crater, 


332      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


Winding  Engine,  Kimberley  Mine. 

for  the  tunnel,  at  this  depth,  entered  the  blue  ground  1134  feet 
from  the  shaft,  corresponding  almost  precisely  to  the  distance 
from  the  mouth  of  the  shaft  to  the  edge  of  the  melaphyre  at  the 

depth  of  300  feet.  For  hoisting 
service  at  this  shaft,  a  winding-en- 
gine plant  was  especially  designed 
by  the  late  Mr.  Louis  I.  Seymour, 
mechanical  engineer  for  De  Beers 
Consolidated  Mines  Limited,  and 
constructed  by  James  Simpson  & 
Co.,  of  London,  England.  This 
plant  consisted  of  a  pair  of  vertical 
tandem  compound  engines  driving 
two  reels.  These  engines  were  de- 
signed to  hoist  six  truck-loads  in 
one  skip,  from  the  looo-foot  level, 
in  45  seconds,  including  filling, 
Mr.  Louis  i.  Seymour.  starting,  stopping,  and  discharging; 


SYSTEMATIC    MINING 


333 


but  in  practice  they  pulled  up  the  skip  carrying  this  load 
from  the  looo-foot  level  in  from  30  to  35  seconds.  Flat  ropes 
were  used,  at  first,  on  the  reels,  but  when  the  shaft  was  sunk 
some  hundreds  of  feet  deeper,  round  ropes  were  substituted  by 
the  adoption  of  the  "Whiting  system,"  first  used  by  Mr.  S.  B. 
Whiting,  general  manager  of  the  Calumet  and  Hecla  Copper 
Company  of  Michigan.  The  dimensions  and  description  of  the 
engines  are  given  in  Appendix  II. 

)>E-BEERS  CONSOLIDATED  MINES  LTD. 


PLAN  OF  600  FT.    LEVEL 
BULTFONTEIN  MINE 


The  only  excuse  I  can  offer  for  having  adopted  flat  ropes 
for  winding  is  that  I  was  persuaded  to  do  so  against  my  own 
judgment  by  a  number  of  American  engineers,  and  experience 
proved  that  I  erred  in  so  doing.  Leaving  all  other  disadvan- 
tages aside,  and  they  are  many,  the  extra  cost  of  ropes  per  load 
is  sufficient  to  condemn  the  flat  rope.  The  average  cost  per  load 
for  flat  ropes  was  .6  of  a  penny  against  .076  of  a  penny  with  the 


334       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

present  Whiting  system,  the  saving  amounting  to  more  than 
^£2000  per  annum.  This  system  as  modified  in  the  diamond 
mines  is  as  follows  :  The  round  winding  rope,  made  of  the  best 
plough  steel,  extends  from  the  skip  over  the  sheave  on  the  pit- 
head frame  down  to  the  reel  on  the  crank  shaft  of  the  engine, 
thence  four  times  around  this  reel  and  a  corresponding  reel  on  a 
lay  shaft  (centres  of  shafts  being  12  feet  apart) ;  thence  the  rope 
passes  around  an  idler  sheave,  the  shaft  of  which  runs  on  bear- 
ings set  upon  a  movable  frame,  which  is  attached  at  each  end  to 
a  carriage  by  means  of  trunnions.  The  carriage  in  this  case 
runs  upon  a  track  50  feet  long.  From  the  idler  or  tension 
sheave  the  rope  passes  around  a  second  reel  which  is  loose 
upon  the  crank  shaft,  the  centre  of  which  is  in  line  with  the 
second  sheave  upon  the  pit-head  frame. 

By  the  completion  of  the  new  plant  the  output  of  blue 
ground  from  the  Kimberley  mine  was  greatly  increased.  Dur- 
ing the  fiscal  year  ending  June  30,  1893,  1,453,152  loads  were 
taken  from  the  mine  as  against  1,310,994  loads,  the  output 
for  fifteen  months  previous,  an  increase  almost  wholly  due  to 
the  new  hoisting  facilities,  for  fully  three-fourths  of  the  yield 
was  drawn  through  the  main  shaft.  The  product  of  De  Beers 
mine  for  the  same  year  was  still  greater.  The  total  quantity 
hoisted  was  1,637,031  loads,  of  which  1,403,060  loads  were 
drawn  through  the  main  or  rock  shaft,  and  only  233,971  loads 
through  the  No.  2  or  west  end  incline  shaft. 

Drainage 

Thorough  drainage  is  of  manifest  importance  in  the  opera- 
tion of  any  mine,  but  it  is  peculiarly  essential  in  these  diamond 
mines.  At  the  commencement  of  underground  mining  the 
inflowing  water  was  removed  by  steam  pumps.  The  use  of 
such  pumps  was  an  error,  for  the  resultant  heat  and  moisture 
caused  the  blue  ground  to  crumble,  and  made  the  ladderways 
so  hot  that  they  were  at  times  impassable. 

As  soon  as  the  vertical  shafts  were  completed  at  De  Beers 


SYSTEMATIC    MINING  335 

and  Kimberley  mines,  Cornish  pumping  plants  were  put  in,  by 
means  of  which  all  the  water  is  now  pumped  from  the  mines. 
The  average  quantity  of  water  taken  from  De  Beers  mine  is 
435°  gall°ns  an  hour,  and  from  Kimberley,  8385  gallons. 
Nearly  half  of  the  latter  influx  comes  from  a  crevice  at  the  junc- 
tion of  the  quartzite  with  an  intrusive  dike  of  igneous  rock 
which  was  struck  while  driving  the  i2OO-foot  tunnel  at  a  dis- 
tance of  600  feet  from  the  mine.  While  no  water  is  found  in 
the  blue  ground  or  mine  itself,  that  which  flows  into  the  mine 
from  the  surrounding  rock  mixes,  as  before  described,  with  the 
debris  which  has  fallen  into  the  worked-out  portion  of  the 
De  Beers  and  Kimberley  mines,  and  makes  mud.  Enormous 
quantities  of  this  mixture  are  from  time  to  time  forced  suddenly 
into  the  working  parts  of  the  mine,  which  are  connected  by  tun- 
nels with  the  loose  debris.  At  times  hundreds  of  feet  of  tunnels 
were  filled  in  a  few  minutes.  Mud  rushes  became  so  frequent 
that  the  working  of  the  mines  was  seriously  interfered  with,  and 
the  loss  of  life  was  very  great. 

At  Kimberley  mine,  large  springs  of  water  flowed  into 
the  open  works  at  the  junction  of  the  melaphyre  with  the 
shale.  Only  a  small  part  of  the  melaphyre  was  then  exposed 
to  view,  and  the  position  of  the  other  part  was  unknown. 
A  tunnel  was  started  from  the  Standard  shaft,  and  driven  to 
the  south  around  the  mine.  Another  tunnel  was  started  from 
the  Harvey  shaft  and  driven  to  the  west  end  around  the  mine 
in  the  opposite  direction  until  the  two  tunnels  met.  The 
total  length  was  2097  feet.  Through  these  tunnels  all  the 
surface  water  and  all  water  coming  into  the  mine  above  the 
melaphyre  was  taken  up  and  led  to  the  pumps  by  means  of 
pipes.  All  water  which  enters  the  mine  in  the  deeper  work- 
ings is  taken  down  in  passes,  sunk  in  the  rock  outside  of  the 
mine.  By  these  precautions  mud  rushes  have  been  completely 
stopped  in  Kimberley  mine,  and  none  have  occurred  for  many 
years  past. 

De  Beers  mine  has  not  been  so  fortunate,  and  mud  rushes 
are  of  frequent  occurrence,  although  the  quantity  of  water  in 


336       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF    SOUTH    AFRICA 

this  mine  is  only  about  one-half  that  of  the  Kimberley  mine. 
The  following  work  is  being  done  with  the  view  of  preventing 
them.  A  tunnel  is  being  driven  around  the  mine  at  the  hard 
rock  (melaphyre)  level,  about  380  feet  from  the  surface,  in 
order  to  take  up  the  water  which  flows  into  the  open  mine 
below  the  shale.  Tunnels  are  also  being  driven  on  the  1000- 
foot  level  on  the  south  and  east  sides  of  the  mine,  which  will  be 
continued  until  they  meet.  Diamond  drills  are  at  work  making 
holes  between  levels,  with  the  view  of  tapping  the  water. 
Everything  feasible  will  be  done  to  free  De  Beers  mine  from  the 
plague  of  water  as  perfectly  as  it  has  been  done  at  Kimberley 
mine.  The  problems  are  not  the  same,  however,  for  in  Kim- 
berley mine  the  debris  had  followed  down  as  the  blue  ground 
was  extracted,  and  had  left  the  hard  rock  more  or  less  exposed 
to  view,  and  one  could  see  in  places  where  the  streams  of  water 
flowed  into  the  open  mine ;  but  in  De  Beers  no  hard  rock  has 
been  exposed  until  lately,  and  one  must  grope  in  the  dark,  as  it 
were,  to  find  out  where  the  water  enters  the  open  or  worked-out 
portions  of  the  mine. 

The  pumping  plants  for  freeing  the  mines  from  water  have 
kept  pace  fully  with  the  advance  in  the  hoisting  plants.  For 
the  service  of  De  Beers  mine,  a  new  pumping  engine  was 
erected  at  the  rock  shaft  in  1889.  This  is  a  compound  sur- 
face-condensing engine  made  by  James  Simpson  &  Company, 
of  London.  Its  high-pressure  cylinder  is  14^-  inches  diam- 
eter, and  its  low  pressure,  21  inches,  with  a  stroke  of  30  inches, 
It  is  capable  of  developing  1 20  horse-power.  With  this  engine  an 
average  of  nearly  6000  gallons  an  hour  was  readily  drained  from 
the  mine  from  the  start,  and  no  difficulty  was  experienced  in  lift- 
ing over  8000  gallons  an  hour  at  times.  The  cost  of  pumping 
is  largely  offset  by  using  the  water  drained  from  the  mine  for 
washing  the  pulverized  blue  ground.  By  combining  this  sup- 
ply with  that  obtained  from  surface  reservoirs,  enough  water 
was  obtained  for  the  use  of  the  concentrating  plants,  except  in 
very  dry  seasons.  For  the  Kimberley  mine  a  Cornish  pumping 
plant  of  400  horse-power,  from  designs  by  the  late  Mr.  L.  I. 


SYSTEMATIC    MINING  337 

Seymour,  was  erected  in  1891.  This  is  a  vertical  triple-expan- 
sion condensing  engine,  with  cylinders  15^  inches,  23^  inches, 
and  37  inches  in  diameter,  and  a  stroke  of  36  inches.  The  gears 
for  this  engine  were  made  by  Fraser  &  Chalmers,  of  Chicago, 
Illinois,  and  the  crank  shafts  by  Sir  J.  Whitworth,  of  Manches- 
ter, England,  but  the  main  constructors  were  James  Simpson 
&  Co.  Ltd.,  of  London.  (See  Appendix  III.)  With  this 
plant  an  average  of  over  12,000  gallons  a  day  was  readily 
pumped  from  the  mine  in  the  first  year  after  its  erection, 
and  since  then  there  has  been  no  further  difficulty  in  handling 
the  influx  of  water  into  the  workings. 


Compressed  Air 

For  all  underground  service  in  the  mines,  in  driving  sinking 
engines,  mechanical  haulages,  rock  drills,  and  any  other  machin- 
ery where  power  is  necessary,  steam  has  been  supplanted  by 
compressed  air.  Electricity  has  also  been  used  for  some  of  these 
purposes,  and  is  the  cheaper  and  better  power  for  many  of  the 
uses  for  which  steam  and  compressed  air  have  been  used. 

Lighting 

For  lighting,  the  application  of  electricity  has  already  proved 
to  be  almost  indispensable.  All  tunnels  and  ladderways  through- 
out the  mines  are  lighted  by  electricity.  In  the  stopes  and  other 
working  faces  candles  are  used.  Electric  lights  have  been  found 
to  be  of  the  greatest  assistance  in  enabling  the  men  to  get  away 
from  rushes  of  mud.  These  occur  at  times  when  some  of  the 
galleries  are  "  hung  up "  (to  use  a  miner's  expression),  which 
means  when  the  tops  of  some  of  the  galleries  are  choked  with 
huge  pieces  of  blue  ground.  The  roof  suddenly  gives  way  from 
the  pressure  of  mud  above,  and  all  open  lights,  such  as  candles, 
are  put  out  by  the  force  of  the  concussion  of  the  air,  and,  were 
it  not  for  the  electric  lights,  the  tunnels  in  the  vicinity  of  the 
mud  rush  would  be  in  total  darkness. 


338      THE    DIAMOND    MINES   OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

Other  Electric  Service 

Electric  bells  are  in  use  throughout  the  mines,  and  have 
very  greatly  promoted  the  rapidity  of  hoisting  through  the 
shafts.  Owing  to  instantaneous  communication  between  the 
man  in  charge  of  loading  the  skips  and  the  engine-driver,  hun- 
dreds of  loads  more  are  sent  to  the  surface  daily  than  could 
be  forwarded  under  the  old  "  pull  bell  "  system.  For  instant 
additional  communication  between  the  surface  and  the  under- 
ground work  telephones  have  been  installed,  and  the  same  rapid 
communication  extends  to  the  depositing  floors,  concentration 
works,  and  offices  of  the  company. 

Natural  Ventilation 

The  Kimberley  mine  is  ventilated  in  a  somewhat  peculiar 
manner.  The  rock  shafts  at  both  De  Beers  and  Kimberley 
mines  are  downcast,  i.e.,  the  air  for  ventilation  goes  down  these 
shafts,  along  the  bottom  tunnels  and  thence  up  through  the 
various  levels,  and  it  is  fortunate  for  the  men  working  in  the 
mine  that  it  is  so,  for  the  cool  air  comes  in  at  the  bottom  and 
ventilates  the  mine  much  better  than  if  the  rock  shaft  drew  the 
heated  air  down  through  all  the  lower  workings.  The  upcast 
in  Kimberley  mine  is  through  the  Harvey  shaft,  the  top  of 
which  is  300  feet  below  the  top  of  the  rock  shaft.  This  shaft, 
with  which  the  various  levels  of  the  mine  are  connected,  extends 
down  to  the  I2oo-foot  level,  and  a  similar  shaft  or  winze  situated 
near  it  extends  from  the  I2oo-foot  to  the  levels  below.  As  the 
top  levels  in  the  mine  are  the  hottest,  the  current  of  air  ascends 
through  the  Harvey  shaft.  The  usual  direction  of  air  currents 
in  mines  with  two  shafts  and  natural  ventilation  is  down  the 
shorter  shaft  and  up  the  shaft  the  mouth  of  which  is  situated  at 
the  greater  height  on  the  surface.  The  reverse  is  the  case  at 
Kimberley  mine.  The  quantity  of  air  which  passes  down 
De  Beers  rock  shaft  was  33,300  cubic  feet  per  minute  until 
1898,  when  the  enlargement  of  the  upcast  shaft  was  completed, 


SYSTEMATIC    MINING 


339 


and  the  air  current  was  increased  to  45,000  cubic  feet  per 
minute.  In  the  Kimberley  mine  the  influx  of  air  per  minute 
is  25,500  cubic  feet. 

Temperatures 

At  De  Beers,  with  temperature  of  the  air  on  the  surface 
79°  F.,  the  temperature  ranges  from  75°  to  77°  in  the  tunnels 
leading  to  the  mine  on  the  1000,  1200,  and  i4OO-foot  levels. 
The  temperature  of  the  air  as  it  leaves  the  mine  on  the  8oo-foot 
level  is  84°.  The  temperature  of  the  mud  after  a  mud  rush 
was  on  one  occasion  85°  F.  Temperatures  at  Kimberley  mine 
in  the  i2OO-foot  tunnel  were,  for  the  air,  71°. 5;  for  the  rock, 
72°.!  ;  for  the  large  spring  of  water  7 8°. 9  F.  The  quantity  of 
water  flowing  from  this  spring,  which  is  about  600  feet  from  the 
crater,  is  3500  gallons  an  hour.  The  temperature  in  the  work- 
ing galleries  on  this  level  is  87°.  Springs  of  water  on  the  1520 
and  1 840-foot  levels  gave  83°. 8  and  8i0-9  respectively,  the 
water  in  the  lower  level  being  the  cooler. 

The  Output  of  Blue  Ground 

The  table  of  statistics  (Appendix  V)  gives  the  amount  of 
blue  ground  produced  from  De  Beers  and  Kimberley  mines  since 
the  formation  of  the  De  Beers  Consolidated  Mines  Limited. 
In  the  same  table  of  statistics  will  be  found  the  average  cost 
of  production  per  load.  It  will  be  seen  that  the  lowest  cost  was 
for  the  year  ending  June  30,  1894,  —  6s.  6.%d.  per  load.  This 
includes  all  charges  from  the  mining  of  the  ground  to  the 
delivery  of  the  diamonds  to  the  valuators.  All  mine  charges, 
including  shaft-sinking,  tunnelling,  etc.,  are  charged  to  current 
expenses.  It  is  interesting  to  note  in  the  same  table  the  great- 
est output  of  each  mine  through  a  single  shaft  for  various 
periods  of  time.  The  maximum  amount  of  blue  ground  pro- 
duced in  one  year  was  1,746,240  loads  from  De  Beers  mine  for 
the  year  ending  December  31,  1897.  This  ground  was  raised 
from  a  depth  of  1000  feet  from  the  beginning  of  the  year  until 
June  14,  when  winding  commenced  from  the  i2OO-foot  level. 


340      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

At  Kimberley  mine,  the  maximum  output  from  one  shaft  was 
1,600,422  loads  for  the  year  ending  December  31,  1893,  hoisted 
from  a  depth  of  1000  feet.  These  figures  do  not  include  the 
waste  or  "reef"  which  is  taken  out,  amounting  to  100,651  loads 
from  De  Beers  mine  and  64,799  loads  from  Kimberley  mine 
during  the  year. 

During  the  month  of  November,  1898,  208,013  loads  of 
blue  ground  equal  to  166,410  tons  of  2000  pounds,  were  hoisted 
through  the  two  skip  compartments  of  De  Beers  rock  shaft  and 
from  a  depth  of  1 200  feet.  The  winding  stops  from  Saturday 
night  at  eleven  o'clock  until  Monday  morning  at  six.  The 
average  number  of  loads  of  blue  ground  hoisted  per  houi  was  349. 
The  average  daily  output  for  a  full  day's  work  was  8376  loads, 
and  for  Saturdays  5933.  The  best  day's  record  was  9790  loads, 
the  best  week's  record  was  50,450.  In  the  above  records  no  ac- 
count has  been  taken  of  stoppages  during  working  hours  nor  is 
the  quantity  of  waste,  which  was  11,992  loads  during  the  month, 
taken  into  account.  Previous  to  this  the  best  month's  produc- 
tion was  from  De  Beers  mine,  in  November,  1897,  a  total  of 
197,173  loads  from  the  I2oo-foot  level.  In  Kimberley  mine, 
the  best  records  for  a  month  were  in  November,  1893,  when 
157,847  loads  were  taken  from  the  looo-foot  level,  working 
three  shifts  of  eight  hours  each  per  day,  and  108,627  loads  from 
the  i2OO-foot  level  in  May,  1895,  working  twelve  hours  per  day. 

The  best  week's  record  from  Kimberley  mine,  winding  by 
day  only,  was  27,418  loads  in  sixty-nine  hours  from  the  1520- 
foot  level  for  the  week  ending  September  22,  1897.  No  account 
has  been  taken  of  any  lost  time. 

From  the  above  figures  it  will  be  observed  that  all  records 
have  been  broken  for  winding  ground  through  a  single  shaft  with 
two  skip  compartments. 

Labor  and  Plages 

The  following  table  shows  the  average  number  of  men 
employed  in  and  about  the  mines  worked  by  De  Beers  Consoli- 
dated Mines  Limited,  during  the  year  ending  June  30,  1897  :  — 


SYSTEMATIC    MINING 


EMPLOYES 

The  average  number  of  persons  daily  employed  is  as  follows  :- 


DE  BEERS. 

KlMBERLEY. 

PREMIER. 

WORKSHOPS. 

ON  THE  ESTATES 
AND  ELSEWHERE. 

Whites. 

Blacks. 

Whites. 

Blacks. 

Whites 

Blacks. 

Whites. 

Blacks. 

Whites. 

Blacks. 

Above  ground 
Underground 

477 
212 

1851 
2001 

I87 
183 

925 
1322 

46 
105 

423 
489 

388 

211 

28 

118 

TOTAL. 


Above  ground 
Underground 


Grand  total  . 


Whites. 

Blacks. 

1126 
500 

3528 
3812 

1626 

7340 

The  average  number  of  white  men  employed  has  increased  to  over  2000  and  the  num- 
ber of  natives  to  over  11,000. 

* 

NATIONALITIES    OF   WHITE    EMPLOYES 
PERCENTAGES 


IN  AND  ABOUT  THE 
MINES  AND  FLOORS. 

AT  THE  WORKSHOPS. 

1894. 

1897. 

1894. 

1897. 

"J2.2 

46.; 

AI.C 

37.1 

Scotch    

6.2 

7-2 

23-3 

2O.6 

Irish        

4.8 

5-6 

2.4 

2.8 

South  Africans        

33-i 

36.8 

27.1 

33-3 

European        ....... 

1.8 

*•$ 

4.2 

4-7 

Other  Nations         

1.9 

2.4 

1-5 

i-5 

IOO 

IOO 

IOO 

IOO 

WAGES 

The  following  figures  give  about  the  average  wages  paid  for  various  kinds  of 
labor  at  the  mines  :  mechanics,  ^5  to  ^£7  per  week  ;  miners,  from  ^5  to  £6 
per  week  ;  guards  and  tallymen,  from  ^4  to  ^5  per  week  ;  engine-drivers,  £6 
to  £7  per  week  ;  natives  in  the  underground  works,  from  3^.  to  $s.  a  day. 

Overseers,  from  ^3  izs.  to  ^4  zs. ;  machine  men  and  assorters,  from  ^5 
to  -£6  ;  natives  (ordinary  laborers),  ijs.  6d.  to  2is.  per  week;  drivers,  from 
25-r.  to  2js.  6d.  per  week.  Every  employe  has  a  percentage  on  the  value  of 
diamonds  found  by  himself.  On  the  floors  the  white  employes  receive  is.  6d.  and 
the  natives  3^.  per  carat.  Nearly  double  these  amounts  are  paid  for  stones  found  in 
the  mines. 


342      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

Dutoitspan  and  Bultfontein  Mines 

If  operations  were  not  pushed  with  the  like  energy  and  lib- 
erality of  outlay  in  Dutoitspan  and  Bultfontein  mines,  it  was 
simply  because  of  sound  economic  considerations,  and  impedi- 
ments unreasonably  placed  in  the  way  of  projected  developments. 
Heavy  falls  of  reef  had  very  greatly  damaged  the  open  work- 
ings in  Dutoitspan  mine  before  it  came  into  possession  of  the 


Mount  Ararat  before  Blasting.  (Removal  of  a  piece  of  "  Floating  Reef,"  Bultfontein  Mine,  1901. 
It  was  150  feet  long,  50  feet  wide,  and  120  feet  high.  180  holes  were  drilled  in  it  and  charged 
with  1050  pounds  of  No.  i  dynamite.) 

De  Beers  Consolidated  Mines.  In  spite  of  this  obstacle,  work 
was  carried  on  actively  for  a  time,  until  it  became  certain  that  no 
profit  could  be  made  by  working  this  mine  and  the  continuance 
of  operations  would  have  caused  great  loss  directly  to  the  con- 
trolling corporation.  If  diamonds  were  like  gold  and  there  was 
an  unlimited  demand  for  the  product,  Dutoitspan  mine  would 
assuredly  have  been  worked  as  long  as  it  paid  expenses  and  the 
barest  margin  of  profit.  But,  seeing  that  the  demand  for  dia- 


SYSTEMATIC    MINING  343 

monds,  or  any  other  precious  stones,  is  practically  limited  to  the 
amount  marketable  without  breaking  down  the  prices  dis- 
astrously to  the  producer  as  well  as  to  every  dealer  and  cutter, 
work  in  Dutoitspan  mine  was  suspended  at  the  close  of  1889. 
The  mine  is  still  idle,  but  a  large  shaft  was  started  in  1901  for 
the  purpose  of  working  it  at  some  future  date. 


Shots  Fired. 


Bultfontein  mine  might  have  proved  more  profitable,  but  in 
1889  an  immense  fall  of  reef,  covering  nearly  the  whole  bottom 
of  the  mine,  made  open  work  impossible,  except  over  a  very  small 
area.  In  face  of  this  situation  shafts  would  have  been  started 
and  underground  work  on  a  systematic  plan  prosecuted,  had  it 
not  been  for  obstacles  set  in  the  way  by  the  lessors,  the  London 
and  South  African  Exploration  Company.  It  was  not  antici- 
pated that  there  would  be  any  profit  in  instituting  these  costly 


344      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH   AFRICA 

underground  works  at  that  time,  but  the  directors  of  De  Beers 
mines  desired  to  furnish  employment  to  miners  out  of  work, 
and  the  mine  would  have  been  opened  and  explored  on  a  return 
of  bare  expenses,  if  the  lessors  had  seen  fit  to  make  reasonable 
terms.  As  their  demands  were  considered  exorbitant,  work  in 
this  mine  was  also  stopped  in  1889,  and  was  only  commenced 


A  Second  after  Firing. 

again  in  1900.  Plan  on  p.  333  shows  how  the  mine  is  being 
opened.  There  are  nearly  13,000,000  loads  of  blue  ground 
in  sight  above  the  6oo-foot  level. 

Premier  Mine 

In  December,  1891,  the  farm,  Benaauwdheidsfontein,  adjoin- 
ing Kimberley,  and  lying  on  the  border  line  between  Griqualand 
West  and  the  Orange  Free  State,  was  purchased  in  full  by  the  De 


MINKS    <>K    SOT  :  H    AFRICA 

tors  of  De  Beers 

;  \>\  me':t         miners  out  of  work, 

•  opened  a>>w  explored  on  a  return 

-r»  had  *it  to  make  reasonable 

red  exorbitant,  work  in 

in    iSSo,  <»m;   was  only  commenced 


Premier  Mine  looking  from  Workings  up  through  Incline  where  the  Blue  Ground 

is  hauled. 


ho\v    the  mine  is  being 
o  io.uis   of  blue  ground 


Mtftf 

Betuauwdheidsfontein,  adjoin- 

iinc  between  Griqualand 

purchased  in  full  by  the  De 


^AUV*' 


SYSTEMATIC    MINING 


345 


Beers  Consolidated  Mines.  On  this  property  the  Wesselton  or 
Premier  mine,  situate  about  four  miles  from  the  town  of  Kimber- 
ley  (plan  at  pages  316-317  gives  its  position  relative  to  the  other 
mines),  had  been  discovered  in  September,  1890,  by  a  Dutchman, 
Fabricius,  who  was  prospecting  for  an  old  resident  of  the  dia- 
mond fields,  Mr.  Henry  A.  Ward,  who  had  a  bond  on  the  Wes- 
sels'  estate,  or  an  option  to  purchase  the  property  for  ^175,000 
within  a  stated  period  of  time.  When  a  man  has  no  money, 


The  Mine  Filled  with  Smoke. 


and  Ward  had  little  or  none  at  that  time,  it  matters  very  little 
to  him  what  amount  he  has  to  pay  for  such  a  property,  for  he 
does  not  want  the  farm  unless  he  finds  a  payable  diamond  mine, 
and  if  he  does  find  a  mine,  some  one  else  supplies  the  funds.  In 
this  case  the  mine  was  found,  but  it  was  one  chance  in  a  million. 
Only  a  small  portion  of  Wessels'  farm  was  in  the  Cape  Colony, 
and  it  was  upon  this  portion  that  the  mine  was  discovered. 

Scores  of  sanitary  pits  had  been  sunk  within  a  stone's  throw 
of  the  mine  before  the  prospector  Fabricius  sunk  a  hole  at  ran- 


346      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF    SOUTH    AFRICA 

dom,  without  any  apparent  reason,  through  ten  feet  of  limestone 
and  found  yellow  ground.  It  was  soon  noised  about,  and  the 
mine  was  rushed  and  jumped  by  a  crowd  from  Kimberley  and 
Beaconsfield,  consisting  to  a  great  extent  of  members  of  the 
Knights  of  Labor.  Hundreds  of  claims  (30  feet  by  30  feet) 
were  pegged  off,  and  holes  averaging  3  feet  by  6  feet  were  sunk 
all  over  the  place,  looking  far  more  like  open  graves  than  pros- 
pectors' shafts  ;  in  fact,  they  proved  to  be  the  graves  of  the 


After  the  Smoke  has  cleared  away. 

hopes  of  the  reckless  jumpers  of  private  property.      Many  of 
the  holes  were  sunk  outside  of  the  area  of  the  present  mine. 

Ward  had  the  sole  right  of  prospecting  for  minerals  upon 
this  farm,  which  was  held  under  his  agreement  with  Wessels; 
but  for  some  time  the  jumpers  held  their  ground  regardless  of 
its  legal  ownership,  and  their  contest  was  the  more  bumptious 
from  the  fact  that  the  mine  was  only  a  few  hundred  yards  from 
the  boundary  line  between  the  Colony  and  the  Free  State. 
Title  to  Wessels'  farm  was  originally  granted  by  the  Free  State. 


SYSTEMATIC    MINING  347 

By  the  laws  of  this  State  all  minerals  belong  to  the  owners  of 
the  farms  upon  which  they  are  found.  In  the  settlement  of  the 
boundary  line  between  the  Free  State  and  Griqualand  West  it 
was  agreed  that  the  farmers  who  had  held  titles  to  their  farms 
under  the  laws  of  the  Free  State  should  retain  the  right  to  any 
minerals  that  might  be  found  upon  them.  After  months  of 
wrangling,  Ward's  claim  was  established  beyond  dispute.  Ward 
was  without  means  to  continue  prospecting,  and  parted  with  half 
his  rights  for  ^£3,000.  When  the  mine  was  discovered,  De  Beers 
Consolidated  Mines  bought  the  interest  which  Ward  had  sold, 
for  which  they  paid  ;£  120,000.  Ward  disputed  De  Beers  owner- 
ship to  an  undivided  one-half  interest  in  the  property.  The 
case  came  to  trial  in  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  Cape  Colony, 
the  mine  having  been  discovered  in  that  part  of  the  farm  lying 
within  the  Colony.  Judgment  was  given  in  favor  of  De  Beers, 
and  that  Company  became  joint  owner  with  Ward  in  the  prop- 
erty, now  called  the  Premier  Mine,  named  by  Ward  in  honor  of 
Rhodes,  who  was  at  the  time  Premier  of  the  Colony,  and  with 
whom  he  had  conducted  most  of  the  negotiation  in  relation  to 
the  purchase  of  the  mine  and  the  final  disposition  of  his  interest. 
In  the  meantime  Ward  had  obtained  an  extension  of  his 
option  for  an  additional  sum  of  ^£1 25,000.  The  directors  of 
De  Beers  mines  were  in  no  way  consulted  in  this  matter.  The 
time  for  taking  up  the  option  was  drawing  to  a  close,  and  as 
Ward  did  not  have  the  money  to  pay  for  his  half,  it  was  mutually 
agreed  that  De  Beers  should  pay  the  purchase  price  of  ^300,000, 
Ward  becoming  responsible  for  the  repayment  of  his  half. 
After  considerable  negotiation  Ward  agreed  to  cede  his  interest 
in  the  mine  on  the  following  conditions  :  that  he  should  take 
over  the  mine  for  a  period  of  five  years,  during  which  time  he 
had  the  right  to  take  out  5,000,000  loads,  equal  to  4,000,000 
tons  of  diamond-bearing  ground.  Diamond-bearing  and  blue  are 
not  synonymous  terms  here,  for  Ward  took  out  yellow  ground 
to  the  depth  of  about  60  feet.  The  mine  was  surveyed  as 
accurately  as  possible.  An  allowance  of  8  feet  in  depth  was 
made  for  the  surface  limestone  which  covered  the  mine  and 


Y>? 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY 

OF 
ORNlfei 


348      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


SYSTEMATIC    MINING 


349 


which  was  supposed  to  be  »0#-diamond-bearing.  It  was  also 
agreed  that  a  load  of  ground  in  place  should  be  9.6  cubic  feet, 
but  this  was  afterward  increased  to  10.6,  as  it  was  found  that 
9.6  cubic  feet  of  yellow  ground  would  not  make  a  load  when 
broken.  From  the  preliminary  washing  of  ground  taken  from 
various  parts  of  the  mine,  it  was  estimated  that  the  mine  would 
yield  about  16  carats  per  hundred  loads  washed.  Ward  took 
possession  of  the  mine,  and  through  contractors  erected  a 
large  washing  plant  capable  of  washing  4,000  to  5,000  loads 
daily.  During  the  five  years  Ward  mined  and  washed  the 
5,000,000  loads  to  which  he  was  entitled.  The  yield  was  about 
20  carats  per  100  loads  by  means  of  the  first  sortings,  and  pos- 
sibly two  or  three  carats  more  were  obtained  by  subsequent  sort- 
ing, so  that  the  total  number  of  carats  obtained  reached  about 
1,100,000.  As  to  the  price  realized  for  these  diamonds  and  the 
cost  of  producing  them,  I  have  no  knowledge,  but  one  may 
assume  that  the  average  value  of  the  diamonds  was  about  i%s. 
per  carat,  and  that  the  cost  of  mining  and  washing  did  not 
exceed  is.  6d.  per  load,  if  it  reached  that  figure.  The  first  60 
feet  were  easily  mined,  as  the  ground  was  decomposed  and  could 
be  sent  direct  to  the  washing  machines  from  the  mine.  At  the 
present  time,  under  De  Beers  management,  blue  ground  is  mined 
and  deposited,  harrowed  and  watered,  and  then  loaded  and  sent 
to  the  washing  machines  for  a  cost  of  about  is.  id.  a  load. 

From  the  year  1871,  when  the  four  mines  at  Kimberley 
and  the  Jagersfontein  mine  were  discovered,  a  period  of  twenty- 
one  years  elapsed  during  which  no  paying  diamond  mine  was 
found,  although  continuous  prospecting  was  carried  on.  The 
Premier  mine  was  covered  for  an  average  depth  of  eight 
feet  with  lime,  which  for  the  most  part  was  diamond-bearing. 
The  formation  of  the  lime  seems  to  have  been  the  result  of  the 
evaporation  of  water  highly  impregnated  with  lime,  or  possibly 
springs  existed  in  the  localities,  whose  waters  were  highly  impreg- 
nated with  carbonate  of  lime,  which  was  deposited  by  the  evapo- 
ration of  the  water.  Water,  in  many  of  the  lime-covered  dis- 
tricts, is  found  very  near  the  surface.  On  the  Wesselton  estate 


350      THE   DIAMOND    MINES   OF   SOUTH   AFRICA 


SYSTEMATIC    MINING 


352       THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

it  shows  itself  in  numerous  "  fonteins  "  or  springs.  Below  the 
lime  coverlet  the  diamond-bearing  yellow  ground  extended  to  a 
depth  of  sixty  feet,  where  it  changed  to  blue  ground.  The 
work  which  had  been  done  proved  the  area  of  the  mine,  and  it 
was  found  to  contain  about  1162  claims  of  diamond-bearing 
ground,  equal  to  about  24  acres. 

Under  Ward's  administration  the  diamond-bearing  ground 
was  removed  by  means  of  trucks  drawn  by  an  endless  chain 
haulage,  which  delivered  them  at  the  top  of  a  large  washing 
plant,  where  it  was  at  once  treated. 

In  January,  1896,  Ward's  lease  expired,  and  from  that  time 
work  in  this  mine  has  been  constantly  carried  on  by  the 
De  Beers  Consolidated  Mines.  An  incline  with  a  grade  of  one 
foot  in  five  was  constructed  in  1896;  the  drainage  water  from 
all  parts  of  the  mine  was  concentrated  in  a  sump,  and  a  pump- 
ing plant  erected  capable  of  handling  the  great  influx  of  water, 
averaging  42,726  gallons  an  hour  in  1896,  or  about  7,178,000 
gallons  a  week.  At  the  end  of  that  year  the  new  works  were 
so  far  advanced  that  271,777  loads  of  blue  ground  had  been 
raised.  For  the  economic  working  of  this  mine,  a  complete 
mining  and  washing  plant,  with  compounds,  machine  shops, 
stores,  and  other  necessary  buildings,  was  installed  soon  after 
the  mine  was  turned  over  to  the  Company  by  the  lessee. 

The  incline  mentioned  above  was  made  through  the  marginal 
reef,  and  down  to  a  depth  of  185  feet.  At  present  the  diamond- 
bearing  blue  ground  is  hauled  from  the  mine  by  means  of  an 
endless  wire  rope  haulage  (see  illustration  opposite)  driven  by  an 
engine  on  the  surface.  The  mine  is  being  worked  in  sections  of 
50  feet  in  depth.  The  ground  is  broken  by  drilling  deep  holes 
(12  feet)  with  jumper  drills  and  blasting  with  dynamite.  The 
average  number  of  loads  broken  per  case  of  dynamite  (50  Ibs. 
net)  is  416,  equal  to  333  tons.  The  breaking  of  the  ground 
was  formerly  done  by  contract,  and  cost  $^d.  per  load  delivered 
upon  the  "  flat-sheets "  near  the  mine  end  of  the  wire  rope 
haulage.  This  mining  is  now  done  by  the  Company.  Loading 
is  done  in  the  mine  upon  the  contract  system,  by  paying  the 


bn 


ori2 


fMf-    DIAMOND    MlNfc'     Of    SOl'TH        'RICA 

'.;>ws   if^eif  in   numtff*.         f'  'i^ins"  or  sp  ngs.      Beiow  the 

,:;ie  goverlct  rhc  d  -t-n  -  LIU;  yello-A  g-,und  extended  to  a 

>,,,t;.    ((f  i;    changed         blue  ground.     The 

wh  \  -,  .:  /afe  proved   the  an-a  of  the  mine,  and  it 

about   1162    chirn-    of  diamond-bearing 

..4  acres. 

...T.'tiiistrarion    rhc  diamond-bearing  ground 

,    of   f'icks  drawn  by  an  endless  chain 

. --iod  rhe'n    ai    the   top    of   a  large  washing 

!   1  .;  .  Ward's  k.ise  expired,  and  from  that  time 

Has    beer,    constantly    carried    on    by    the 
,!   Minos.      An  incline  with  a  grade  of  one 
structed   in    1896;   the  drainage  water  from 
.  ntrned  in   a   sump,  and  a  pump- 
PREMIER   MINE., 
Showing  Mine  being  worked  in  the  Open.     The  water  on  the  right, represents 

about  one  million  gallons  daily,  which  finds, its  way  into, the  mine, iand,.haswere 

to  be  pumped  out. 

r!,.it  loal--          'ilue  ground   had  been 

tu>!v:          -soikintj   o!    ihi«=   nune,  a  complete 

'..uhme    shops, 
.rs,  U»K        -niied  soon  after 
.  .1  o\-e    r •>  th-.   (  o'^'panv  bv  the  lessee. 

;nade  tKiough  the  marginal 

At  present  the  diamond- 

:  in  •  -  Hie   irnne   by  means  of  an 

;  opposite}  driven  by  an 

i  ..-.n ij,  worked  in  sections  of 

•i;u!U'  jri  bv  drilling  deep  holes 

:-s  A::-  i  wit! *   dynamite.     The 

•  ,kci         r  ca->e   of  dynamite  (50  Ibs. 

i>reakii;g   of  the  ground 

-,,!;!•  -.:    s'.!,/.  |ier   load   delivered 

r  'nine    end    ->f  the   wire   rope 

-  }>\-  rh«:.  Company.     Loading 

contract  svstem,  by  paying  the 


x-  '^  y$  1^  A. 

/      A          )F     THE 

';'   UNIVERSITY 


SYSTEMATIC    MINING 


353 


Premier  Mine,  looking  up  the  Incline. 

natives  i$s.  for  100  loads.  The  cost  of  hauling  and  depositing 
is  about  6d.  per  load.  In  open  mining  the  natives  are  paid  i$s. 
per  100  loads  (80  tons)  for  loading  and  delivering  to  a  flat- 
sheet  from  100  to  150  feet  from  the  place  of  loading.  On 
the  floors,  after  the  ground  is  pulverized,  us.  per  100  loads  is 
paid  for  reloading.  The  ground  is  treated  in  the  same  manner 
as  at  De  Beers  and  Kimberley  mines,  which  will  be  described  in 
the  following  chapter. 

There  is  a  large  body  of  floating  reef  in  the  mine,  which 
measured  about  350  feet  by  200  feet  on  the  surface,  but,  at  the 
depth  of  500  feet,  it  has  been  nearly  displaced  by  diamond-bearing 
ground.  As  already  mentioned,  these  large  blocks  of  floating 
reef  are  portions  of  the  country  rock  which  have  broken  loose 


354        THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 

during  the  time  the  craters  were  being  filled,  and  were  not 
incorporated  in  the  breccia  of  which  the  blue  ground  is  com- 
posed. In  some  instances  the  "  floating  reef,"  or  "  islands,"  is 


One  of  the  Early  Washing  Machines. 

the  same  as  the  amygdaloid  rock  or  melaphyre,  which  surrounds 
the  mines  at  a  depth  varying  from  300  to  400  feet,  but,  as  a  rule, 
somewhat  altered.  It  will  be  noticed  that  the  aerial  gear  is  not 
used  at  the  Premier  mine,  and  the  reason  is  that  for  shallow 
depths,  or  for  depths  down  to  200  feet,  inclines,  either  open  cuts 


SYSTEMATIC    MINING 


355 


or  shafts  inclined  to  as  great  an  angle  as  it  is  practicable  for  a 
wire  rope  haulage  to  work,  are  more  economical. 

Up  to  the  present  time  the  difficulties  of  falling  reefs,  which 
caused  so  much  trouble  in  the  other  mines,  have  not  yet  arisen. 
A  belt  of  blue  ground  some  seventy  feet  in  thickness  has  been 
left  standing  in  places  to  support  the  friable  decomposed  basalt 
and  shale  with  which  the  mine  is  surrounded.  This  is  but  a 
temporary  remedy,  and  one  which  does  not  recommend  itself  to 


Washing  Plant,  Standard  Company,  Kimberley  Mine,  1888. 

the  engineer,  owing  to  the  value  of  the  ground  which  is  being 
temporarily  sacrificed.  It  is  my  intention  to  combine  the  open 
with  the  underground  system,  and  to  remove  the  blue  ground 
which  lies  adjacent  to  the  reef  in  the  same  manner  as  it  is  now 
done  in  De  Beers  and  Kimberley  mines,  and  at  the  same  time 
to  work  the  remaining  portion  of  the  mine  in  the  open,  as  at 
present,  so  long  as  open  mining  can  be  safely  and  economically 
carried  on.  Owing  to  the  enormous  flow  of  water  from  the  reef 
into  the  mine  (the  blue  ground  itself  contains  no  water),  it  will 
be  necessary  to  sink  a  shaft,  and  to  drive  tunnels  to  tap  these 
large  springs,  and  lead  the  water  away  from  the  mine.  The 


356      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF    SOUTH    AFRICA 


SYSTEMATIC    MINING 


357 


average  quantity  of  water  pumped  from  the  mine  is  about 
40,000  gallons  per  hour,  or  more  than  three  times  the  quantity 
which  is  pumped  from  De  Beers  and  Kimberley  mines  com- 
bined. In  order  to  make  use  of  this  water,  it  is  pumped  to 
De  Beers  floors  for  washing  the  blue  ground,  and  to  the  village 
of  Kenilworth  for  irrigation  purposes. 

The  average  yield  of  diamonds  for  several  years  past  under 
De  Beers  management  has  been  three-tenths  of  a  carat  per  load. 


No.  2  Washing  Plant,  De  Beers  Floors. 

The  value  of  the  Premier  mine  diamonds  as  compared  with 
those  from  De  Beers  and  Kimberley  mines  is  about  twenty  per 
cent  less,  owing  to  the  greater  proportion  of  boart  and  small 
diamonds.  The  diamonds  from  this  mine  show  distinctive  char- 
acteristics, and  a  parcel  of  them  can  be  easily  distinguished  from 
those  produced  from  other  mines.  It  is  estimated  that  the 
production  of  this  mine  could  be  raised  to  1,000,000  carats 
per  annum.  The  mine  is  being  developed  for  the  commence- 
ment of  underground  mining.  Plan  on  page  318  shows  the 
shape  and  size  of  the  mine  on  the  5OO-foot  level.  It  is 
estimated  that  there  are  13,000,000  loads,  equal  to  10,400,- 
ooo  tons,  of  blue  ground  in  sight  above  this  level.  The 
Premier  mine  may,  therefore,  be  looked  upon  as  a  mine  of 
very  great  value,  and  one  which  will  play  an  important  part  in 
the  future  history  of  the  diamond-mining  industry. 


358      THE    DIAMOND    MINES    OF   SOUTH    AFRICA 


Jagersfontein 

Mention  has  been  made  previously  of  the  Jagersfontein 
mine.  It  was  the  first  of  the  so-called  "  dry  mines  "  discov- 
ered. The  mine  is  very  large,  containing  1124  claims.  The 
average  yield  of  the  ground  is  about  eleven  carats  per  one  hun- 
dred loads.  The  quality  of  the  diamonds  far  surpasses  the 
yield  of  any  other  crater.  The  mine  is  noted  for  its  large  blue- 
white  diamonds,  and,  now  and  again,  an  exceptionally  large  stone 
is  found.  One  stone  cut  as  a  brilliant  weighs  239  carats  and  is 
without  a  flaw. 

Two  full-size  reproductions  are  here  given  of  the  largest  dia- 
mond found  in  the  mine,  its  weight  being  971  carats.  For 

many  years  after  their 
discovery,  the  richer 
mines  of  Kimberley 
offered  greater  induce- 
ments to  the  digger  as 
well  as  to  the  investor, 
but  the  fever  for  con- 
solidation attacked  the 
directors  of  some  of  the 
principal  companies  in 
this  mine,  and  the  New 
Jagersfontein  Mining 
and  Exploration  Com- 
pany Limited  was 
incorporated  in  1888, 
about  the  same  time 
as  De  Beers,  and  the 
various  interests  were 
gradually  absorbed. 
The  mine  is  still  worked  in  the  open,  and  during  the  last  few 
years  has  had  some  difficulty  with  falls  of  reef.1  The  reef,  from 
the  surface  down  to  the  depth  of  about  twenty  feet,  is  shale. 

1  See  Appendix  VI. 


Excelsior  Diamond,  971  Carats.     (Found  in  Jagersfontein 
Mine.    Actual  Size.) 


BLUE-ANO_- 

-r.YEL.LOW  -_/ 

"GROUl: 


PLAN  AND  SECTION 

OF 

JAGERSFONTEIN    MINE. 

SCALE      -&M 


SYSTEMATIC    MINING 


359 


The  rock  underlying  the  shale  is  basalt,  which  extends  down  to 
the  lowest  point  where  the  country  rock  has  been  exposed, 
i.e.  about  250  feet. 

A  table  of  statistics  showing  the  amount  of  blue  ground 
hauled  and  washed  and  tfre  quantity  and  value  of  diamonds 
produced  since  the  formation  of  the  Company  will  be  found 
under  Appendix  VI.  This  mine  was  shut  down  from  Decem- 
ber, 1900,  to  July,  1902,  owing  to  the  war.  During  this  period 
the  mine  became  flooded,  and  the  water  was  not  all  removed 
until  the  end  of  1902. 

The  plan  and  section  of  the  mine  are  given  opposite  this 
page. 


Another  View  of  the  Excelsior  Diamond. 


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